There Are No Hymns In Hell
by Slocut
Summary: Sequel to "Gone Again" Could stand alone with a few gaps. Dean is burning with fever and Sam needs help, but will demons from Dean's time in hell find him and get their revenge first?
1. Chapter 1

DISCLAIMER: Unfortunately not mine, save the OC

_Sequel to Gone Again, it could stand alone but pieces may be missing without the prep. This story is multi chapter and will be updated quickly. Thanks so much to all the reviewers. You make me smile :D_

Chapter 1

Molten fire surrounded him, the smell of burning flesh and despair floated heavy in the air. The demon leaned over him taunting, tangling around him. He felt the bite of a blade. It dug just below the skin before twisting, burrowing deeper and carving hunks of muscle and skin from his body. The wail of a thousand tormented souls pressed on his consciousness. So loud, it was like a physical blow. The blade came down again, lower, carving patterns across his ribs. He felt the blood flow. He was wet, soaked in blood. It was on his face, ran down him and pooled behind his back. He fought the demon's hands but they wrapped around him, suffocating him. His chest was crushed, he couldn't breathe.

"SAAAAAMMMM" he screamed, but it came out as a whisper. He heard someone begging, pleading for the pain to stop. Hell, he was in hell. He had been in hell forever, burning for his sins.

The ground shook and he heard his name whispered, then spoken, then shouted.

The knife came down again but his scream was a whimper. He saw Alistair's face hover over him with malicious glee in his eyes.

"Sing me a song Dean. Let's hear it!" he cooed, as the blade danced down his side to burrow into his leg.

He was spinning and shaking, parts of him were flying off. Where was Sam? He had to find Sam! Sam had to find him. He could remember his voice, his face, but his eyes were burned away. He would never see his brother again and tore at him more than the knife hacking his leg off, the teeth tearing at his shoulder.

"STOP, NO MORE, PLEASE SAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAM!"

The heat was eating away at what was left of his flesh, he felt himself incinerate, he was lava, he was hellfire, he burned and burned and there was no end.

Sam woke to the sound of his brother's desperate moans.

"Dean?" he said, shaking himself awake and rushing to his bed. "Dean, its OK. Wake up."

He watched his brother struggled in the tangled sheets, sweat pouring from him. The dressing on his shoulder was saturated with blood. His thrashing must have torn the stitches. The wound on his bicep sluggishly leaked through the scabbing. Sam threw the light on and considered the best way to wake his brother without making things worse.

He remembered when Dean was first back from hell. The nightmares were like this, fierce and debilitating. More than once he had tried to wake him, and had found himself on the floor with his brother trying to strangle the life out of him. It had been two years since he had seen him this bad, but he was hurting himself and it had to stop.

"Dean, man, its OK, you gotta wake up." When he heard his brother calling for him, begging for relief, he reached over to restrain his flailing arms. That is when he felt the fever. His brother was burning up.

Sam shook him and Dean fought harder. Horrible noises escaped his dry throat. All at once he arched his back and stiffened. His head twisted and his body convulsed. Sam threw himself across his chest trying to keep him on the bed. It seemed like forever before he felt his brother relax and lapse into unconsciousness.

Sam ran to the medical kit and grabbed the thermometer. He pushed it to Deans ear and pressed the button. 105.2. Sam tried it again, that couldn't be right. It read 105.1.

He flew into the bathroom and turned the shower on cold, then ran to untangle his brother from the sheets. He quickly pulled him into a sitting position before dead lifting him and carrying him into the bathroom. He dragged him into the shower and stood there holding his brother under the cold water.

His chest burned from the contact. He turned his brother around and held him below the arms, cold spray in Deans face and chest.

"Oh my God, Shit, Oh my God Dean please wake up!" he said, trying to feel his brother's breathing.

Was he breathing? Oh please he had to be breathing. They had just been asleep a few hours. He had been feeding Dean antibiotics he scammed out of an urgent care by faking a dental abscess. The hot young doctor had given him a nice supply of pain pills to go with the Z-Pac and get him through the weekend. It was supposed to work. What the hell.

Dean started to shiver so hard he slid from Sam's grasp and ended up in a heap on the shower floor. Sam propped him up in the spray and headed back to the med kit. He dragged out three tylenol and crushed them onto powder with the butt of his gun, then threw them in a shot of whiskey.

Sam knelt next to his brother and tipped the man's head back. He pushed a bottle of water to his lips and tried to make him swallow. Dean choked and most of the water ran out the edge of his mouth but he began to rouse.

"Dean, swallow!"

He pressed the bottle to him again and he managed to take a tiny sip, swallowing clumsily. He opened his eyes and stared at Sam. "Cold." he said, before his head lolled to the left.

Sam smacked him on the cheeks to rouse him again, then pressed the whiskey to his brother's mouth. He poured the medication filled shot in and covered Dean's mouth with his hand until he swallowed it all, choking and sputtering.

Dean curled away from the cold water. He tried to roll out of the shower but grabbed his hip and shouted in pain. Sam reached for him.

"GET AWAY!" he yelled, pushing at Sam, beginning to fight him in earnest. Sam hauled him to his feet and dragged him to the bed, tossing him down on his stomach and placing a knee to his lower back. He pulled down the edge of Dean's boxers with dread, seeing the saturated dressing over the healing stab wound. He pulled the dressing off and saw the gash was bright red and oozing. Sam pressed his hand to the edge of it and a mountain of yellow oozed out between the stitches.

They were in trouble.


	2. Chapter 2

_Point taken on the OC's, If they didn't kill all the cool demons off I wouldn't have to make up my own. :D _

Chapter 2

Simon Keller stood in front of the ornate mirror surveying the damage done to his face. He winced as he prodded the bridge of his nose where it swelled into a shattered cheek bone. Waking up in that medical facility had been a waste of time. Loss of consciousness was so undignified. His beloved could heal him leaving no traces. Now that he had been seen in the ER and the police had photographed the injuries he had to let this all heal as if he were human. Questions were thrown at him, answers demanded, It had taken all he had to not climb into their minds to make them tear each other apart. All of them were so open to suggestion. It was funny really.

This body was weak. It did not fit him, as it should. He was too small, too frail. He looked down at the small thin hands and remembered his last host body. He had been strong and beautiful. The years the man had spent honing every muscle had been to Simon's benefit. He missed the speed and strength of a vessel worthy of his power. The Winchester boy had felled him in just a few blows. It was another humiliation at their hands.

The warlock threw his head back and spoke a Latin invocation to conjure his paramour.

A stream of black smoke undulated around his legs and wrapped around him like a snake, climbing slowly up his body before shooting into his mouth. The man welcomed her presence and felt the bliss of sharing his consciousness with his consort. His broken bones knit together, the pain receded across his body and morphed into a euphoric thrum. The bruises remained, after all they needed to play their part if they were to get their revenge.

The pair communicated without words, knowing each others every thought. He walked to a marble cabinet and pulled open the ornately carved door exposing a black alter. He lit the candles surrounding the pentagram and placed a picture of their nemesis on a silver disc at the center.

Did he really think this was over? That he could hide from them? They had caught his scent. Dean Winchester was already a dead man, it was just a matter of time.

Simon drew a knife and deeply slit his forearm. He allowed his blood to flow over the face staring up at him from the photo before tossing a powder of wormwood and sage across it.

Red was Dean Winchester's color, he mused. He smiled as his blood enveloped the last trace of the image. Chanting filled the room as he lay a map across the pentagram before drawing out a string of crystals. He held them over the map and they glowed red hot. Tossing a match onto his blood offering, the crystals exploded into prismatic light, dropping from his hand onto a small square in the corner of the map.

He smiled as he spied the address they had scryed for. They had him. This was the day when the Righteous Man would be cast back into the pit. In his last human moments he would see his brother die in agony, torn to pieces. They would make Dean Winchester scream and beg, as they had screamed for him on the wrack. They revel in decades of flaying him to pieces, only to start over again. Revenge would be sweet.

The black smoke slid from his mouth and wrapped around his face before shooting out a ceiling vent. His beautiful demon would find Winchester. There were so many humans with so much anger. They would coax one to end the man's life, before dragging his shining soul down and pressing so far down into the flame that no angel or devil could find it.

Sam stood in a shadowed corner of the cavernous room. Breaking into the house had been surprisingly easy, he was almost disappointed. He was at his wits end. Dean's fever had responded to the medication but was still too high. It was a temporary fix, and Sam knew his brother needed more help than he could give him. Doctors sympathetic to hunters had dwindled away, moved on, died or been tossed in jail. They had no family, no safe house to head for. God how he missed Bobby.

In desperation he had stuffed two tranquilizers down his brother's throat so he couldn't hurt himself. He looked down at the rumpled rose scrub pants in his hand and wadded them into a ball. He could feel parts were stiffened with dried blood. He never got to thank the woman who helped sew Dean up and protected them from the police. He figured he had two hours, maybe three before Dean would wake up. That would be about the time the fever would creep back up.

He watched her stretch out, then tie her hair back before tossing a sleeveless hoodie over her head. Unlocking the deadbolts she relocked the door from outside before putting ear buds in and starting at a steady run down the street.

Sam relaxed and explored. He folded the pants she had lent to Dean and placed them on an end table. He climbed the stairs, looking into each room as he passed. He found a gun safe with a combination lock and a pair of key bolts. He shook his head thinking about the shotgun and the semi automatic he had found on her at their first meeting. If she carried that around, he could only imagine what she needed to lock up.

He picked up a picture in the room he thought may be hers. Two smiling people in dappled beige fatigues stood with guns propped on their hips. Apparently there was more to Kim Christian than meets the eye. A more formal portrait of a man in Army dress blues was placed carefully by the bed.

Another photo showed the man leaning over his bride as she arched back over his arm with a blissful smile. Kim was married, a husband could complicate things. He threw open the closets but saw no evidence of men's clothing. He turned and saw a flag folded into a perfect triangle in a redwood box over the mantle. He approached it and read the brass plate on the front. Major Jacob Christian US ARMY 10/31/67-5/17/09.

Widowed then. He felt a brief rush of sympathy before pushing it back down and resuming his search. He started down the back stairs and stopped to scan the pictures of what he assumed were her family members. He was startled to see her in full uniform, apparently she was an officer also. That explained a few things, but in the end it didn't change a thing. He needed her help, and he was going to get it.

He listened closely before heading back down the stairs and edged around the corner as she unlocked the door. Before stepping into the house she poured the rest of her water bottle over her head and shook herself off. She walked into the kitchen and rubbed a towel over her face. Stretching again she paused in the doorway. Sam thought that he had been discovered.

She jumped up grabbing for a bar over the high doorway and missed. "Damnit!" she said trying again and sliding off. She took off the hoodie and dried her hands with it before jumping again and catching the bar. Groaning she began to do pull ups, switching her hand grip frequently to work different muscles. She dropped to the floor with a little huff and shook out her arms. As she bent to pick her up her hoodie she caught sight of something pink and bloody on the end table. "Oh Shit." she whispered.

She bolted up the stairs, but Sam was too fast. He caught her before she crossed the landing. They didn't fight like the first confrontation they had, he simply shook her hard and pressed a hand over her mouth.

"Stop, I just want to talk, and there is no one else here so you might as well save us both time and listen. Are we good?"

She shook her head NO and started to struggle again. He held her against the wall and let her fight him for awhile. He remembered to avoid her teeth and watch for head butts. She was already tired from her run, and she soon went limp and tried valiantly not to tear up in frustration.

I'm going to uncover your mouth, ok?

She nodded yes. He dropped her and stepped back.

"I know who you are. You are Sam Winchester. Your brother Dean is the one we sewed up. Have you ever Googled yourself? NO? Well you should. No last names necessary, just put in Sam and Dean. Its a fountain of information. Your brother is quite handsome when his face isn't hamburg, the pictures are just wonderful...especially the mug shots. Wait let me see if I remember. Murder, actually multiple murders, larceny, bank robbery, desecrating a corpse, vandalism, impersonating a police officer, OH and a federal agent, assault with a deadly weapon, arson...should I go on? You are a pair of sociopaths. I assisted a matched set of damned serial killers!

"Don't believe everything you read." he said

"Is it true?"

"Some of it."

"Awesome. What do you want." she said backing away against the wall.

Can we go downstairs? He coaxed.

"NO."

"Then its your room." He advanced toward her .

"We'll go downstairs." she said sliding past him and grabbing the banister.

"I already took the gun out of the safe, and the one in the desk." He pulled her gun out of his pocket and pulled out the clip, dropping it on the floor.

She spun on him furious. "What do you want Sam." I have money, but you have already been in the safe, and if that is what you wanted you'd be gone.

"I need you to help Dean. There is something wrong with him, he has a fever and is hallucinating. The wound we dug the blade out of is bad." "He had some kind of seizure or something."

"Excuse me if I am repeating myself but "CALL AN AMBULENCE!" If you had done that three days ago when I told you to, he wouldn't be in this state now! He was laying on a concrete floor with an open wound, what did you think would happen?"

"Please Kim, I know I have no right to ask you but I need help. You are a nurse, maybe you could see something I'm missing. I left him alone and he is unprotected. I gave him some pills to make him sleep because he was hallucinating and hurting himself."

"What did you give him?" She said worrying for the injured man, wondering why she cared.

"Uhhh, whiskey, tylenol, and diazepam. Thats it."

"Whiskey? God why?" She yelled.

"So he would take the Tylenol!" Sam yelled back at her, running his hand over his head in frustration.

Did you take his temperature?

Of course I did. It was 105.2. So I threw him in a cold shower and made him drink tylenol mixed with whiskey.

"Was he awake when you left ? Can he keep anything down? Does he know who you are?"

"He ate OK for a couple days but not yesterday, he mostly slept and said the antibiotics were messing with his stomach. He knew me on and off but not so much when I left. I need to get back there." She didn't respond or meet his eyes. He felt anger flare to match his panic and boxed her in between his arms against the wall.

"Sam let me make something perfectly clear. I am not a doctor."

"I know that." Sam said pacing away from her.

"I can't practice medicine."

"I'm asking you to look at him, just come and look at him." he said coming way to far into her personal space.

"And do what?" Kim yelled in frustration.

She wanted to help them, she didn't know why but she wasn't afraid of this man. Dean had reminded her of so many of the boys she had seen in Iraq, that was why she didn't call the police when they ran. It was why she had wondered about him these last three days. She knew this story was going to have a bad end, she could just feel it.

"Help me! I'm just asking you to help me!"

"To do what? If I tell you he is going to die without a hospital, will you let me get him help? You can run. I'm sure with the two of you separated and with the way he is beaten up like that no one would recognize him."

"NO." Sam said heading for the door. She wasn't going to help he had to get back to Dean. There had to be another way, and he would find it.

"Look, Sam," she said, grabbing his arm as he passed. "I won't agree to go with you, that would be aiding and abetting a fugitive, two fugitives, but if you were to... compel me to, you know, go and look at him... I couldn't be held responsible. So if you were to _insist _ then what could I do?

"What? Wait. You want me to ...uhhhh...OK." "Get in the car now or I'll .. make you?"

"Where is he." she said grabbing her bags.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

A writhing tendril of black smoke shot between the buildings, heading for its target. She didn't try to hide from the humans in her path. This was the beginning of the end. The end of Dean Winchester. The Winchester saga. The Winchester menace. They had waited years for this, plotted and planned, but their hands were tied. They could butcher the whole human race but could not touch him. It would be easy enough to twist a human into killing him. In the end the human she chose would be her weapon, and her weapon would finish him. She would torment the brother while Dean and her lover watched. Oh how she loved the screams of humans, the terror and the despair, but she knew that from Sam Winchester the most they could hope for was pain. Pain would be enough, for a start.

The hovel of a building came into view and she could sense him inside. She slammed into the window and then the door but was repelled back. She tried to slide through the vents but was burned by the salt line and cringed away. Circling the building madly she saw a window being hit by water spray from a childs sprinkler. As she cautiously approached the salt line on the inner sill began to melt away. At the first sign of a break in the line she forced her way through and burst, elated, into the room.

The devil's trap surrounded her. She swirled and pushed and screamed but could not penetrate the outer ring. She yelled her fury to her lover miles away and she knew the instant he felt it. He would come and free her, then they would make them pay. She could feel Dean's fear escalate as she screamed. She set up an unholy wail that shook the building just to feel him fold into himself with terror. It was delicious.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

"What do you mean motel? You left him drugged and feverish and alone in some seedy dive?" "Please at least tell me you left him on his stomach in case he vomits. You did right...Sam? Pull over, right here, SAM PULL OVER!" She shouted.

"Who exactly is kidnapped here?" he snapped back.

"I need to get stuff in the pharmacy for Dean, It'll only take a minute."

"I'm going with you." Sam said climbing out of the car after her.

"Yah, no kidding, I'm kidnapped. Look menacing in case there are security cameras OK?" "Make yourself useful Mr grumpy pants and get some gatorade and bottled water. Is there something he will eat that's super salty? You have anything left for dressings? Any alcohol or peroxide? No? Well get that too. And I need bleach, not the cheap stuff."

Everyone greeted her that she passed, small town America, it was a blessing and a curse. It was hard to be inconspicuous when everyone had known you since birth.

Sam hated to admit it, but he felt himself relaxing. She was running the show and he could take a breath. He scanned the isles tossing items into the carriage trying to anticipate anything they might need. He grabbed every container of salt off the shelf sheerly on principle then went heading searching for her. Bottles of liquid motrin and an infant oral syringe fell out of the pile in her arms and he tossed them on top of his items. She dumped a hefty arm full of supplies on the top of the carriage before heading to the register.

"Hey Kim." The cashier said, eying Sam speculatively. Her eyes roamed over him with unguarded interest. "Is he with _you_?" "Do I know you? You look very familiar?"

"Hey Nat, This is Constantine, He is from Greece. I met him stationed there a couple years ago. say Hi Connie." she said throwing down a credit card before wrapping herself around Sam and rubbing her hand suggestively over his chest. She grabbed a package of condoms and slapped them on the register with the other supplies.

Sam watched the woman's mouth drop open. He draped his arm around Kim and kissed the top of her head before lifting her hair and smelling it with a mock blissful look.

"Hello Pat, you know my Kimmy?" he said, pretending to lose interest as he rubbed a section of her hair over his lips.

"Nat."

"What?" He said looking as perplexed as he could.

"My name is Nat, Natalie."

"Of course it is." he said. "You have a nice day Natalie."

He leaned over and whispered into Kim's ear. "Should I throw you down right here or are we done?"

Kim laughed and ran a hand up is arm as they left the store to stuff the back seat with supplies. "You are one crappy casanova." she said.

"What was all that for?" Sam said, slightly annoyed. "Constantine? Seriously?"

"This is a small town, do you want people talking about me or do you want them talking about you.? You're on the run remember. She is gonna call everyone in town she knows and have you be a half naked twenty two year old boy toy by the end of the day. That makes me the center of the gossip. The other option was letting her calling her friends about the six foot four God with green eyes and a 12 pack. With your luck if she Googled green eye'd God with a twelve pack it would show your very attractive mug shot."

"Oh. The condoms were a nice touch." Sam said blushing to his roots.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

Dean crawled on his belly, dragging himself over a never ending field of broken glass. The earth shook around him and he couldn't even keep to his knees. His left arm was useless. His left leg hanging in tatters. A searing shard of iron impaled his lower back and protruded through his hip but he dragged himself forward, gasping and heaving. The demons were almost on him, he knew what they would do when they found him. The screaming came closer, and the stench of sulfur hung in the air. They were coming for him, he knew they were coming because they were calling his name. He felt his head spin and gave up trying to move forward. He curled up on the glass and tried to make himself as small as possible.

0o0o0o0o00o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

"You weren't kidding, this place is just awful." Kim said, hopping over one of the many pot holes in the parking lot.

Sam reached for his keys and stepped up to his room. He paused as he inserted the key, seeing a smear of yellow across the door. He dragged his finger through the stain and brought the powder to his nose. "Damnit!"

He grabbed Kim and dragged her to the car shoving her face down into the back seat. He popped open the trunk before tossing the keys onto the Impala floor.

"Stay there, Don't come out, I'm not kidding around, this isn't a joke do you understand me? If I am not out here in five minutes, FIVE MINUTES... Drive, don't look back."

She nodded and pulled her self as far from him as she could in the confined space. So much for not being afraid of him. As he stormed back toward the room she peeked over the front seat to see Sam kicking in the room door with a shotgun in his hand.

She was not going to just sit there and let someone come to kill her, or worse. She climbed out of the car and ran to the door. She could see Sam on his knees with his hands over his ears. The shotgun lay discarded to his side and she bent to scoop it up. She looked for the threat but didn't see anyone. It was impossible to concentrate over the blaring TV. She turned to turn it down, but the television was off. The sound was throbbing and sharp and made her wince. How could there be wind inside the room when there was none outside? Her hair flew into her face and she watched a rickety desk chair teeter and tip over. This was crazy. The beds were empty, no Dean, so she dropped next to Sam and shook him.

"Hey what the hell is going on?" "Where's Dean? What the hell is all that noise?" When he continued to cower she slapped him hard and he seemed to snap out of it, looking at her, startled, before scanning the room for his brother.

He climbed to his feet and grabbed the door frame, leaning into the bathroom. A harsh wind almost blew him back. A Demon flew in the constricts of a devils trap slamming against the sides. The sounds of hell rolled out of the room and tried to smother him. He had almost forgotten.

No he hadn't.

"What the hell is that?" Kim said, raising the shotgun to point it at the pillar of boiling smoke. Sam pushed the barrel down and told her straight. "Its a demon, its trapped for now but we need to get Dean and get out of here, now."

"Demon? That's impossible!."

"Dean!" He yelled. No response. He scanned the darkest corner of the room and saw his brother curled on the floor.

Sam threw a sheet over Dean and lifted him off the floor. "Go, start the car, open the back door."

She ran out of the building and threw open the back door of the Impala. She retrieved the keys and vaulted over the seat, shoving the keys into the ignition and starting the engine.

She jumped back over the seat and grabbed Dean under the arms to help slide him in. She was immediately struck by the heat. It was like holding a space heater. Sam flew back into the room with the shotgun and she heard two distinct blasts before he ran out and hopped in the car. The door was barely shut as the car roared out of the parking lot.

"Where are we going?" she asked Sam.

"I don't know. I demon proofed the room, this wasn't supposed to happen. He is alive right, he wasn't moving."

"He's too hot to be dead, but I can't turn him over so I can see whats going on. We have to get somewhere right now so I can get a look at him. My house is too far. Wait, the bar, we can be there in ten minutes. We don't open for hours, It will buy us time. Is that thing coming after us?"

"I don't think so not that one, we are safe for now if it was alone." Sam said. "Thanks, you know, for in there."

" Are you saying that there are more of those things? What is this freaking x-files? We need to have a long talk Sam."


	4. Chapter 4

"There are a couple of apartments up here, I never rented them. The electricity is on, the one of the left has a bed, damnit, I didn't bring the keys."

Sam kicked in the door and strode in carrying his brother. He walked to the back of the apartment looking for a place to lay Dean down. The bed looked filty, the room was hot and smelled moldy. It was better than he was used to.

Can you hold him another minute, I have to get something to put under him. Sam heard her running down the steps, then quickly head back up. She covered the bed with towels and Sam rolled his brother carefully onto the mattress.

"Sam, you need to run down and get the stuff, my bag is the most important, make sure that comes up first, Oh and the bleach." Kim said untangling Dean and rolling him onto his stomach. She lay her hand on his back and knew that his fever was doing damage. She ran into the bathroom and looked at the large cast iron footed tub against the wall. Turning on the hot water she peeled off her hoody and rubbed at the dust and grime settled at the bottom. Sam came flying in the room and she yelled for him to bring in the supplies. She dumped bleach into the bottom of the tub and rubbed it up the sides before rinsing it. Sam yanked open the window to let the fumes out, then ran down the stairs to get the rest of the bags before stashing the Impala out of sight.

She turned the water on cold and plugged the drain, before heading back to Dean. She grabbed the thermometer out of her bag and ran it across Dean's forehead before placing it behind his ear. 105.5. He needed a hospital, but she knew that wasn't going to happen. She considered briefly calling 911 before Sam got back, but he stormed back in before she could make her decision.

"Sam, downstairs there is an ice machine in the back left of the kitchen. Bring up all of it, toss it into the tub, its gonna take a few trips."

She considered her options. If they couldn't bring him to the hospital, maybe they could bring part of the hospital to him. She had one huge errand for Sam, and he needed to do it now. Dean sputtered and mumbled to himself. Sweat poured off him and he tried weakly to struggle. He was in a bad way. If the ice didn't bring down his temperature she was going to go over Sam's head and call the rescue. She wasn't going to let the man die.

The tub was half filled with ice and freezing cold water. "Sam, here's what we need to do, I'm going to get into the tub, and you are going to hand him to me. Put his back against my chest. He isn't strong enough to hold himself up and I need to be in a position I can hold his head up. She climbed into the tub hissing at the cold, it was unbearable. Sam lifted Dean and placed him down into the water. As soon as he hit the cold he arched and screamed, flailed weakly at his brother before crying like a two year old. His body immediately warmed the water, and Sam packed more ice around him.

"Go in the bag and get me the liquid motrin and the tylenol, and that syringe." "He isn't going to like me very much for awhile. With any luck he wont remember any of this."

Sam filled the syringe with the medication as Kim ran ice over Dean's lips. It melted on contact and he turned hid head away before swallowing weakly. "Good enough." she said, tipping his head back over her shoulder and letting the medication dribble in. Sam held his brother's head still when he tried to struggle away, and eventually the last drop eased down his throat.

"Sam, I need you to do something." she said, teeth chattering from the cold water.

"Anything." he said

The rescue bus was right where she said it would be. The driver knew to park it just out of the range of the hospital security cameras. The doors stood open, and the mess from their last run was strewn across the floor. He could hear the EMT's chatting up the ER nurses who were smoking around the corner.

He climbed into the back and grabbed the two zipper cases filled with unknown equipment and headed back to the stolen car he left in the emergency lot. He eased back into the ambulance and pulled open the bench seat. He stuffed a dozen liter bags of fluid down his shirt before punching in the medication lock box and stuffing as much as he could grab into his pockets. He looked around for anything else they could use and grabbed some kind of plastic tubing and needles before sprinting to the car and burning rubber back to his brother.

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.

The silence was oppressive, all she could hear was Dean's uneven breathing. She started to hum to him, and he began to relax into her. She quietly sang amazing grace and he turned his face into her throat and shifted against her. She reached her hand up to his neck to feel his pulse, it was slower and regular. He seemed better. She, however, was freezing her ass off. He moaned and turned sharply away from her so she started to sing again. He melted back against her and grunted as she gripped him to hold him above the water.

They shivered together. The only warm spot on their bodies was where his back rest against her chest. The combination of the cold water and the motrin seemed to be working. She couldn't feel her feet and was starting to feel a little groggy. That probably wasn't good.

A few minutes after Sam left, Dean began to talk. His hallucinations seemed to wax and wane. He would beg someone named Alistair to stop...something. She didn't know why, but she was sure that Dean had been at the man's mercy at some point. He called for someone named Cas, from the tone she wondered if Cas was a man or a woman. His wife or his sister? Maybe she would ask Sam. He imagined Sammy being hurt, tormented, even imagined him burning in hell. It was a little over the top even for a hallucination, but his distress was real. He threatened to kill someone named Ruby, almost dragging her under the water with his struggles. The last one he called for now was Sam and that had been almost an hour ago.

They needed to get out of the water. She found herself drifting off to sleep. She couldn't let that happen.

"Dean," she said carefully, you need to wake up. She held his head up and splashed the water onto his face. He pulled away. "DEAN!" she said more forcefully. Dean attempted to hold his own head up and continued to shiver.

"Quit it." he mumbled.

"Dean we need to get out of the water, can you let me up?" She wondered f she could stand on her numb legs.

As Dean began to rouse the first thing he was aware of was the cold, oh my God, he was so cold. The second, was a pair of muscular female arms wrapped around his chest. They were in a tub. He tried to look over his shoulder but his head throbbed. Where the hell was he?

"This is too kinky even for me." Dean said, laying on the charm for the unknown woman behind him.

"Can you sit forward, I need to get out, then I'll help you get back to the bed." She said through her tremors.

"I don't think I've ever said this before, but I don't know if I'm up for that, you know, cold water and all."

"Oh God you're a comedian." Lean forward, dammit you're heavy and slippery." He grabbed for the sides of the tub but couldn't seem to get a grip. She pushed him forward and when he bent forward a screaming pain shot through his hip.

Now he remembered. Where the hell was he? She pushed herself out from behind him and fell over the side of the tub onto the dirty floor. She slapped her legs trying to get feeling back into them. Dean slid briefly below the surface of the water, coming up sputtering.

"What the hell?" he said, looking down at the wet shivering woman trying to climb to her feet. Her hair clung to her in welt clumps and she shook from head to toe. Her body was amazing, he filed that information away for later use.

"Can you stand?" She said pulling at his arm.

"Where's my brother?" he said.

"He'll be back, but you need to try to get up." Come on I'll help you to the bed, I need to look at your wounds."

"Who the hell are you? Where are we?" There was no way that he was getting out of that tub. He seemed to have no control of his arms and legs, he could only shake. He felt himself sliding down again, he felt a sense of panic. She reached down into the water to pull the plug and awkwardly pulled him back up when Sam burst in.

"Sam a little help here!" she said.

Sam dropped the supplies he carried and reached for his brother plucking him out of the tub. Dean could not support his weight and hung off his brother like a dish rag, but he was awake, and he felt cool.

Sam placed his brother on the bed and Dean lay there shaking. He looked at Kim and she was an unnatural shade of blue, but was peeling off her wet clothes and heading for the bathroom with a pair of sweat pants. She came out in less than a minute and headed back for Dean.

"Dean this is Kim." Sam said;

"What the hell is going on?" "I feel like shit."

He struggled to sit up but fell back to the bed.

Kim waded through their stolen supplies. She found a blood pressure machine and IV supplies, a cardiac monitor that probably cost the town thousands of dollars, along with a portable oxygen set up. The cardiac monitor was useless to them at this point, but the other items were gold. Sam pulled a pile of meds out of his pocket and tossed them on the bed. She looked for antibiotics but unfortunately there were none. First things first. She grabbed the thermometer.

Deans temp had dropped to 100.1. His pulse was back up to almost twice normal, and his blood pressure was in the toilet. She wanted to start fluids on him, then she would call in some favors at the hospital and get some high end, probably expired antibiotics.

"Dean I need to start an IV, you are gonna need some antibiotics. I'll try to get them soon. I know you're cold, but its gonna ease up, we cant cover you right now, I'm sorry. " she tied a tourniquet around his upper arm and felt around for a vein. She put in the largest bore she had and hung the IV bag off the curtain rod, leaving it wide open to flow in as fast as possible..

"Look I have things I need to get. If I'm not back when the bag runs out, switch it with this one, she said , tossing it to Sam. Don't let air in the line, if it gets in there pull the damned thing out, I'll put it back in later. Look, you cant medicate him for pain until his blood pressure comes up, I'm sorry its just not safe." She said pulling her sneakers on.

"Sam, What about that thing? Is it coming, because if it is I need to know."

"I can put up some protection to keep Demons out. It wont take long." He dug in his bag and pulled out a talisman on a chain and hung it around her neck.

Whats that for?

"That is to keep the demons away" he said evasively.

"So now it cant hurt me?

"Oh it can hurt you, but it cant crawl inside of you."

She stared at him hoping he was joking. Apparently he wasn't. "Try to get Dean to drink." she said heading down the stairs. Pulling out he cell she called the first number on her contact list.

"Gary, hey its me, look there is no water at the bar so you cant open tonight, I have a plumber coming, but today we are closed, maybe tomorrow too. Can you call Russo and Kayla and let them know? Ya, Thanks a lot hon." She closed the blinds over the front window and taped a sign on the door. Closed for repairs.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Sam arranged the only chair facing his sleeping brother. He dug through his bag for his laptop and his father's journal. Something wasn't right. The demon at the motel was way too powerful. He had seen countless demons smoke in and out of people but had never dealt with one that could cause the disturbances that happened when this one was in the devil's trap.

He pictured the demon trying to escape, slamming against the borders. The speed was incredible, the sound was horrifying. He had read his father's journal from cover to cover over the years and couldn't remember an entry that would explain any of it.

When Dean had been injured, it had been by humans. They had watched the demon smoke out of the man before it had attacked. Come to think of it, when the man was possessed, the demon was watching humans attack his brother, manipulating them. The bullets had been aimed at his back, not at Dean's.

He remembered the man running at Dean with the knife and the awkward fall they had taken to the floor. If his brother hadn't been beaten half to death and shot that would never have happened. He could have swatted the little man away like a fly.

His thoughts were all jumbled, he was so tired.

He looked at his brother laying sprawled out on the musty bed and wondered what it was like for people who went through their entire life never having been beaten, shot, stabbed, tortured or attacked.

Did they sleep peacefully? Did they imagine themselves growing old and dying in their sleep? What would it be like to live in blissful ignorance? If Dean could read his thoughts right now he would tell him to stop being a girl.

How many times had he been in just this position. Watching his brother lie painfully still because even unconscious, his body knew that movement was pain. He looked at his brother's back and saw the myriad of scars he had suffered since Castiel had dragged him from the pit.

Just a few years ago he had been totally unmarred. He tried to remember which ones he had sewed up, which hunts, which monster had caused them. Some he remembered some he didn't. He was pretty sure Dean wouldn't remember either.

He looked at the IV bag hanging from the window, he should change it over. He ripped the rubber cap off the new bag and switched it with the almost empty one. He stepped closer to his brother and let his hand hover over his back. It had only been two hours since he pulled him from the ice bath, three since the medication and already he could feel the heat rising off him.

Where had she gone? He should have asked when she would be back but she started slamming out questions and orders then was gone. On impulse he rifled through the bags and pulled out one of the containers of salt they had bought. He walked around the bed and poured a perfect unbroken circle around it. Even with the windows and doors salted he felt his brother was unprotected.

He heard someone shake the door knob tying to enter the room and reached for the shotgun.

"Sam, open up."

He flung open the door and she blew by him heading directly to Dean, She walked through the salt circle, breaking it open rendering it useless. He was going to have to talk to her about a few basics.

"I got him some Rocephin and Vanco. This should kill whatever it is giving him the fever. He has to get it for at least for or five days, you guys aren't going anywhere." She walked through the salt line again and he just shook his head. "I have to deal with the infection, he isnt going to like it. I called one of my buddies that was a surgeon in...well in the service, and he said we have to open the stitches and clean it out. I got some Lidocaine, but that is usually a doctor thing. I can try to numb him up some, it'll hurt way more than stitches."

"What do you need me to do?" Sam said. He watched her ease the blood pressure cuff onto Dean and press the button.

"I brought some stuff, its downstairs, but lets get the meds up. We'll wake him and tell him what I'm gonna do. I hope you don't have to hold him." She looked down and saw a messy strip of white drawn on the floor with a salt container next to it. "Why is there salt all over the floor?"

0o0o0oo0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

Sam hauled a bar table up the stairs and he watched her cover it with a bleached white cloth. She lined up her supplies and tossed a package of sterile gloves on the bed before sitting next to Dean on shaking him gently.

"Damnit he is hot again." she said. "Dean, wake up honey, I've got to work on that wound on your hip.

"Sam?"

"Ya Dean, I'm here." Sam said coming to his brother's side.

"I'm gonna be sick." Sam turned him onto his side as he dry heaved. His grimaced in pain and wretched harder. "Don't let her touch me. She is evil. I know it." His eyes were vague but he focused in the woman.

Kim reached down for the container of salt and poured it on her hand. She stuck her finger in it and licked it off. Sam handed her his flask of holy water, and she poured some over her arm then took a sip. "Gross, its warm." she said. "All better?"

"Silver knife." he said staring at her.

"Let me get this straight, you want me to cut myself with his knife so you don't think I'm some kind of monster? "

He just continued to stare at her. Waiting.

"Look. I find you half dead in my back room, try to help you and end up tied up with duct tape, then your mutant brother makes me watch him reassemble you before POOF you're both gone. Then I get dragged here to save your happy ass and now you want me to cut myself."

"You do it or I will." Dean growled.

"Oh for God's sake!" "Can you talk any sense into him?" she said.

Sam looked at Dean's face. "Probably not."

She held out her hand for the knife, Sam placed it in her hand with a grateful look. She put her foot up on the bed where he could see it and rolled up her pant leg. She cleaned the knife and her ankle with alcohol then made a tiny cut. She saw Deans face relax as he watched the drops of blood well up. His whole body seemed to melt and he eased back onto his stomach.

"I still don't like you." Dean said. He heard himself and knew he sounded like a child, but it was the best he could do.

Sam took control of the conversation, knowing things had gotten out of hand. "Dean she is gonna give you a shot to numb you first then she is going to get the infection out. I told her I won't have to hold you down, I won't right?"

"Of course not, when did you ever have to hold me down?" Dean slurred indignantly.

"You need to lose the boxers Dean. Gotta get to the spot, Its nothing I haven't seen before." She said pouring betadine in over a hunk of gauze.

Sam tried to help Dean but he slapped his hands away. "Do you mind?" Dean said, but eventually gave up. Sam helped him lose the boxers.

She looked at the angry wound leaking on his hip. She painted over the area with the betadine and he hissed, glaring at her. She put on sterile gloves and had Sam open each package and set it on the table.

"OK, she said picking up the needle. "Here we go ."

She eased the needle into the skin at the far edge of the wound and shot in the tiniest bit of medicine. She knew how bad the sting could be before it started to numb and tried to be as careful as possible. She eased it deeper slowly, letting the area freeze over before advancing. It took forever before the whole area was numb but it was done.

She reached into one of the packages for sterile scissors and began cutting the stitches open. Once the wound was open she pressed at the edges. She wanted to look away from the yellow and red that oozed out, but swallowed past a gag and continued. She poured peroxide in and it bubbled up. When it ran back clear, she changed her gloves and stuck a finger into the hole. It was deep, the blade

that had broken off in it was five inches long, but it was still kind of horrifying digging into it with the patient looking at you.

She felt something. What the hell? She tried to dig it out but couldn't catch it. She reached for the forceps and pried the wound open looking for the foreign object. She pulled out a piece of cloth, it looked like denim, just a tiny piece, but it was enough. That was what caused the infection.

Dean's eyes were beginning to glaze over with fever again, she wanted to finish up and get something into him for his temperature. The ice bath wasn't an option any more with the wound open again. She packed the hole with gauze soaked with disinfectant and slapped a dressing on it. She had to let any more pus leak out before closing it.

"All done, for now." she said, pulling off the gloves and gathering up the bloody mess she had made to toss it out.

The adrenaline rush from the stress was fading. She was quite sure she was going to pass out. Sam had filled her in on demons, spirits, salt lines, holy water and a score of other juicy tidbits she needed to know before she got to carve up his brother. It all hit her at once and she stumbled into the bathroom and slid down the wall to sit on the dirty floor. She saw the blood on her shoe from where she cut her ankle and tried to scratch it off the white leather.

She started to laugh, and Sam stood in the door to check on her. She was laughing then she was crying. He came into the cramped bathroom and sat against the wall with her. "Thanks." he said quietly, not looking at her. He sat with her as she cried. In a few minutes she was better. Mostly.


	6. Chapter 6

The warlock chanted over the pentagram and cut himself yet again in blood offering. Seven times he had commanded spells to bring back his lover. Each was more powerful than the last, and all should have resurrected the demon so they could continue on their dark path. Wind whipped through the ornate room tearing at the curtains, but when the maelstrom settled there was nothing.

He couldn't fathom how this had happened. She was there wailing her magnificent fury, writhing in the ecstasy of Winchester's fear and then it had all stopped. He felt a burst of confusion from her and nothing more. Now the echo of her presence that he had carried for centuries was already waning. There was no punishment he could mete out that could salve his agony.

He let out an inhuman scream and the walls around him burst into flames. He threw the black alter in the air with a turn of his head exploding out the windows with a look.

Memories of their time in hell pulled at his mind as the house collapsed around him. The years on the wrack. He could picture them entwined together in the body of the gypsy they had ridden for decades. The apprentice reveled in carving into them in obscene ways. The deeds that earned them the time on the wrack escaped him, but every slice gouge and prod were branded on his consciousness. He remembered Alistair's silky whine praising his newest pet as he ripped them to shreds over and over.

There had been glee in the torture master's feral eyes as he realized there were two distinct evils residing in the gypsy bitch. She was the last of a dead line. There was no other vessel that could contain them as one for more than moments. They were one mind one thought, synergy. It was destined for them to remain intertwined even in hell, or so he had thought. It was the apprentice that had devised the ultimate torture. For that alone he would pay.

Dean Winchester had laughed as he meticulously tore their souls from each other ripping them into two separate entities. The pain was so great it had a sound of its own, a color. He saw that color now.

Alistair had sensed the warlock's great power as they were laid bare. He had heard the unspoken promise for revenge. Alistair's last act before casting them off the wrack and into the pit was to curse him, taking away that one hope. A simple curse declared that he could not harm Dean Winchester.

The smoke from the destroyed house still drifted from smoldering rubble. What appeared to be a man stood in the center of the wreckage, his eyes glowing the red of hellfire. He lifted his arms to the sky and he felt the wind whip past him, then through him drawing strength from his anger. He let the memories pour over him fueling the pulsing fury building in his chest.

Crawling out of the pit had been impossible, but luck had granted him escape. He had been conjured from the pit by a pair of simpering white witches. They had slid too far into their grandmother's book of shadow and spoken the spell in haste. He had taken one of the women as vessel and quickly summoned his consort to his side. She slid into the second witch like a fine blade and they set about exacting their revenge.

He had torn through a dozen host bodies before he found Winchester. He had projected jealousy and envy into the hearts of two otherwise useless humans to exploit a lovely loophole in the curse. He would not kill the man, but he would instrument his death. Revel in it.

The ultimate insult was the moment that he realized that Dean Winchester didn't remember them. To Dean, they had been just one of many. He had ruined them, tormented them, crippled their destiny and he didn't remember them. He would remember them now. He would remember them forever.

He walked out of the rubble and summoned his powers. He imagined the curse in the palm of his hand as a throbbing orb of pale blue formed there. He crushed it to dust.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Sam watched his brother thrash and pull at the sheet. Dean had rested for a few hours after the ordeal with his wound. It had seemed for a brief time that he had turned the corner and would recover. He had opened his eyes and was able to keep down some liquid. He had helped when they turned him to slide the fresh sheets under him, he had even rolled to his back for a time.

When he became restless, Sam had assumed it was from the local wearing off around the incision. He had seen his brother become surly and uncooperative when he had pain since they were kids. He remembered thinking as a child that his brother was indestructible, but looking at his ashen face he seemed far too human.

Kim had expended nervous energy pulling apart the room around them, it almost looked like someone could actually live here. A timer on her phone went off and she ran down the stairs to grab another antibiotic. Sam felt himself drifting off against his will, his head would fall forward and he would jerk awake. He was going to have to give in at some point and get a few hours of sleep, but not now.

"We are going to have to sit him up again to medicate him for fever, do you want to help me get him on his back?" Kim said.

Dean didn't resist being manhandled onto his back and pulled into a sitting position. Kim slid behind him and supported him sitting with her back against the headboard. Sam drew up the medication and handed it to her. It had become a pattern over the last day, the cycle of fluids antibiotics and medications. They both watched as he swallowed sluggishly, mumbling and trying weekly to turn away from the syrup.

He seemed to drift off to sleep propped up with his head lolled against her neck. She stayed behind him letting him rest there. His breathing seemed regular and even. That wasn't much but it was the best they had at the moment.

"Sam, go hit the couch, try to get a couple of hours. I'll stay here with him, he seems comfortable for now". She became insistent when Sam nodded his refusal. "You need to be at 100% if that thing comes here. If he gets any worse you are right there and I'll wake you, please."

Sam lay down facing into the couch and drifted off in minutes. Kim only realized she had fallen asleep when Dean's mumbling woke her. She shushed him quietly and looked over at Sam. He had fallen asleep neatly tucked into the couch, but at some point in the last two hours he had rolled over and sprawled out face down with one arm resting on the floor.

She leaned her cheek against Deans forehead and he felt cool. That was a plus. He shifted against her and she could pick out the occasional word he said. He was definitely hallucinating. There was just no reason for it. The fever seemed manageable which most likely meant the antibiotics were doing their job. When he shifted again and attempted to pull away, she started to hum. It had worked when he was in the tub, and she had no other ideas. He stiffened and went very still before he slowly relaxed and eased back against her. Please, she thought, let this be medical not supernatural.


	7. Chapter 7

Dean was in a room, white walls, blindingly bright, stone silent, icy cold. Some parts of hell weren't hot, the frozen parts held their own agonies. The air phased in front of him and a demon appeared, wait it was a man, a human. There was something not right here, but he couldn't seem to grab onto the thoughts hovering in the back of his mind.

The man walked up to Dean, painfully close. He could hear the man whispering in Latin quietly. Without warning the man shoved his hand into Deans chest between his ribs. He was powerless to move, the pain was all consuming.

"They say there is evil in hell, but you are the evil on earth. I am the last of my line, but I will outlive you Dean Winchester."

The man twisted his hand and pulled, and Dean saw his heart still beating ripped from his chest. He felt himself fall to his knees with the shock and agony. He reached up to cover the gaping hole and felt his life flowing out between his fingers.

A sound crept into his awareness and he latched onto it. It all ran together but it let him breathe, made the pain dim. He could almost feel his heart back in his chest. It was music, he had heard it before somewhere. It was a hymn, he knew it. This couldnt't be real, because there were no hymns in hell, only wailing screams or a crushing void. He let the sound roll over him and the pain and the blood washed away. He looked up at the man and he saw his heart dissolve into nothing in his hand.

"I am coming for you," the man said smiling." There is nothing that can protect you from me, and the magic to kill a warlock has been forgotten for centuries, I will drag you to hell myself. Oh the times we will have! You and I will be very special friends again Dean. This will be the last face you see."

oo000o0o0oo0o0o0o

They were running out of fluids. There was no way to lift more from the EMTs, the hospital would be much more careful after everything they had stolen. Sam had wandered out to pick up food and supplies. The bar staff had been told that he was the new tenant so he could come and go without notice. Kim figured that leaving the place closed would draw more attention than that little white lie. Life downstairs was going on as if nothing had happened, as if there were no demons, no magic, no curses or monsters. No half dead hunter on the bed. Had she ever been that naive?

She began to hum to herself. It was a nervous habit but no one was here to see it. She took her iPod out and hit shuffle, Josh Grobin popped up first and You Raise Me Up started to play through the tinny speaker. She sang with it briefly then gave up and went back to humming while she gathered supplies.

"Dean, Dean honey you need to roll over so I can change your dressing." she said, not expecting a reply. She rolled him over with some difficulty and peeled off the tape. She had enough supplies for maybe two more days and with any luck that would be all they needed. She put on gloves and pulled the gauze out of the wound, fairly pleased that the drainage was no longer a product of infection, the hole still gaped but it was healing from the inside. The scar would be horrific but he should live. He shouldn't be delirious, the whole thing made no sense.

Dean mumbled with the change in position, there was a look of distress on his face, he maybe even looked confused. She considered rolling him on his side since she was done. As she packed up the mess she looked at Dean for the first time, really looked at his face. The swelling was gone, the bruising was faded to yellow. He was really very pretty, almost beautiful. Too bad he was such a miserable jerk. She pushed him onto his side and jammed pillows behind him to stop him from rolling back.

On his shoulder was the most bizarre scar, in the shape of a hand print. She ran her finger over its raised surface, wondering what could have caused it. Her first thought was chemical burn, but no, it wasn't a heat injury either. It was raised, but not tight like a ropy scar from sharp injury. She placed her hand directly over it, judging it to be the size of a man's hand not a woman's. It looked angry but felt soft. How odd.

His hand shot up and covered hers. She tried to pull back but he held her there. When she looked at his face his eyes were open..

"Cas." he mumbled.

"No, its not Cas honey, can stay awake up for me Dean?" He mumbled again and she climbed onto the bed to try to hear what he was saying as a crease of frustration or pain formed between his eyes. He grabbed at his chest and screwed his eyes shut, grimacing.

He opened his eyes and looked at her, they were the purest mossy green. "Warlock."

"No, no I'm not! Sam will be right back Dean. Try to stay awake for me." she said as his eyes drifted shut again.

Kim grabbed Dean's phone off the table and saw the only saved number was Sam's. She called it.

"Dean?" Sam answered.

"Ya, not quite." she responded . "Look I don't know if this is important, but Dean came around for a minute and thought I was someone named Cas. He said something, warlock, just that one word. He is out again now, I couldn't keep him awake."

"There are no warlocks, they are extinct. There are male witches yes, but not warlocks. I'm coming back."

As she put the phone in her pocket Dean roused again and pulled out his IV, he reached back and pulled the dressing off she had just sealed then reached to yank off the one covering his shoulder.

He attempted to struggle off the bed and managed to almost make it to a standing position before his knees buckled. His eyes frantically scanned the room. "Sam?" he said. Then "SAAAAAMMMM!" loud enough to shake the walls.

"Shhhhhhhhh, Dean, you have to calm down, someone will hear you, we're hiding remember?"

"SAAAAAAAM!" he yelled before his eyes rolled back.

Blood leaked from the IV site onto the formerly clean sheets, he was half off the bed and probably way to heavy for her to lift. She wondered what else could go wrong until she heard banging on the door.

"Hey is everything alright in there?" mans voice demanded."

Perfect, she thought, just perfect.

O0o0o00oo0o0o00o0o0o

"Hey, what's going on?" Kim said opening the door with a plastic smile.

"Oh, I didn't know you were up here, is everything OK? I heard yelling." The burly bartender looked over her shoulder into the room trying to push past her.

"Its all good. He was just having a nightmare, PTSD, you know. I've got it."

Sam jogged up the stairs and paused seeing that they had company.

"You must be the new tenant. I'm Jack the bartender downstairs." The man offered a hand shake.

"Constantine." Sam said in greeting.

"Ah." the man said sizing Sam up. "My neighbor Natalie mentioned you. I'll just get back, nice to meet you." He said with a smirk, heading back down the stairway.

"Oh, you suck." she said to Sam.

"You started it." He said.

Sam locked the door behind him and lifted Dean back onto the bed." So tell me what happened."

"I already did, he got a little agitated after that, but that's it."

Out of the blue a crack of thunder shook the walls. Sam turned to the window and saw clouds rolling in to cover a clear blue sky. Lightening struck a utility pole outside the building as torrential rainfall began to fall. The lights flickered off.

"We have to put up wards to keep whatever this is out. There are too many windows, I don't think I'm gonna have time."

"Can I help? What the heck is a ward?" She said watching people outside run for cover from the storm.

Sam grabbed a marker and drew four symbols on her forearm. Copy these onto the door, and under the windows. Be exact or they wont work."

Sam grabbed a can of spray paint from his bag and ran to begin placing the wards across the walls. If they hurried maybe they would have a chance.


	8. Chapter 8

A red and gray mist hovered outside the windows. Sam could see it pulse against the window as if reaching for them, but as it would touch the window it would hiss and pull back. The first movements were tentative, like an exploration, but within minutes the walls and windows shook against the onslaught. Sam pulled a shotgun and salt shells out of his bag and pocketed the demon knife.

Dean roused slowly. He felt a mattress and soft sheets under him and tried to stay perfectly still while he assessed the room. Some pain, nothing he couldn't handle, but oh God did he feel weak. Where were his clothes? He turned his head slowly bringing Sam and a woman into focus. He remembered her. She was a hunter...no...she was a nurse, the bar owner. The walls of the dingy room were covered in wards. He recognized a few, anti witchcraft, protection, devils traps, a few were new. Why was this place familiar?

A sound at the window drew his eyes and he saw a misty haze flecked with red pulsing against it. He saw the woman begin to salt the window frames and the door before running a salt line around the bed he lay on. She looked up at him and stopped in her tracks.

"Sam..." she said over her shoulder.

Sam turned and followed her line of vision, seeing Dean's alert eyes searching the room. He rushed to his brother's side and helped him up into a seated position before pressing a water bottle to his mouth.

"Hey, are you with us?" he said laying his brother back down. " Tell me what's going on , we put up wards against demons and witches, I couldn't find anything on warlocks. As far as Dad knew they were extinct centuries ago."

"What? I..I don't know what you're talking about. Warlock? What the hell is going on Sam?" Dean said trying to sit himself up.

"You have been in and out for days, mostly out. You woke up and said warlock. Something is out there. Something that I have never seen, but the wards are holding it back. What do you remember." Sam said.

"I haven't been out, I've been reliving my glory days in hell. Something is in my head, I can't control it."

Dean thought back to the year that Sam lived with Lucifer in his head. He hadn't imagined it like this. Now he knew how bad it had been for him.

No one saw the thin tendril of mist leaking into the room through a ceiling vent, it ran down the wall and began to pool on the floor. It snaked between Kim's legs and wrapped a vice like grip around Sam's ankle pulling him off his feet. His head hit the floor with a hollow thud, leaving him stunned as it slid up his leg and over his belly. It wrapped around his neck and tightened, leaving Sam fighting for air. He tried to grab at it, but it wasn't solid enough to hold, just as he would get a grip his hand would pass through it. yet it lifted him from the ground.

Dean fought his way out of the bed but when he tried to stand his legs wouldn't hold him. He landed face down on the floor a few feet from his brother. Sam's struggles weakened and he began to see spots in front of his eyes. Dean dragged himself forward as Sam went limp and was dropped to the floor.

Kim watched in horror as Sam's lifeless body lay in a boneless heap. The entity enveloped Deans body. She saw his eyes widen before he was flung onto his back, his face contorting in a nameless emotion before he fell unconscious. She ran to Sam and checked for a pulse before beginning rescue breathing. This couldn't be happening.

Dean heard a voice echoing in his head as reality shifted away from him. "Your brother is dead. I laughed as I choked the life from him. I felt as his soul left his body screaming for you to save him, did you hear it Dean? He is mine now."


	9. Chapter 9

They both looked dead. Kim stared from one brother to another, wondering how this could have happened. They probably were dead, she probably would be in about a minute. Her daugters would never know what happened to her, some freak murder suicide or a home invasion. Three dead bodies in a filthy apartment over a bar, golden, thats just how she wanted to be remembered.

The mist left Dean before it flew at her as she leaned over Sam and bounced away, she crouched on the floor with her arms wrapped around herself expecting to be attacked, strangled like Sam or tossed around like Dean. All it did was torment her by advancing menacingly and pulling back over and over. A rumbling muted wail emitted from somewhere inside the vapor. She felt the hairs on her arm and at the back of her neck stand on end as that sound pulled a blind panic from her chest. It was never meant to be heard on this earth, it was evil.

She looked over her forearm and saw Sam still laying in a heap, his face dusky. She knew if there was any hope for him she had to act now. She crawled forward under the entity and checked for a pulse, he was too blue to be breathing on his own. As she turned him fully onto his back two blades fell from his pocket, one was the silver knife she had cut her leg with, the other was the bowie knife she had seen him with covered in runes. She grabbed the silver knife and swung at the mist. Nothing. She struck at it with both blades in desperation. It pulled away sparking in a spiral before easing back up the wall and out a vent.

She dropped back to her knees next to Sam, tipping his head back and pinching his nose shut. She would not let him just die like this, he was going to wake up now so she could kill him herself for dragging her into this madness.

Two breaths, thirty chest compressions, two breaths, thirty compressions, two breaths...and he gasped in a great gulp of air and coughed. She put her hand to his throat, feeling a steady pulse before turning toward Dean's sprawled out form. He lay in an unnatural position, arms flung out to the side with his eyes wide open and sightless. She shook him and called his name, reached for his neck to feel for a pulse and was surprised to feel his rapid heartbeat. She watched to see if he was breathing, barely seeing his chest rise and fall. She would have bet against finding him alive.

She looked between the men, not sure where to start. Both needed a whole crew of medical professionals, but she was alone. She picked the knives back up and turned in a circle looking for any return of the entity.

Sam lay on his back with his eyes open, he had a hand pressed to the spreading bruise across his throat. His mind was clearing. He tipped his head in Dean's direction. His brother lay perfectly, ominously still. Kim hovered between them with a knife in each hand looking furious and terrified.

He reached his hand forward to get her attention, gripping her ankle. She let out a horrified yelp at the contact, flinging herself back awkwardly. She felt herself falling but instinct wouldn't let her let go of the knives. She hit the ground hard, knocking the wind out of herself. The world tilted and she let it all fade to a comforting black.

0oo0o0000oo0o0o0o0

"_He is mine now. He is mine now. He is mine now_."

Dean saw the scene replay over and over in his mind. He was only vaguely aware of the sounds and smells of hell around him. He was almost numb to the physical pain and suffering. Sam was dead, it was real, he saw him die. This time there was no one to drag him back. It was his fault, he was right there. The guilt was a sedative, smothering the screaming in his brain.

He let the hollow ache in his chest pour out, suffocating him. It was over, and it didn't matter. Dean was done, they couldn't hurt him any more because he was gone. He let his mind fold in on itself until he was an unfocused blur and nothing could touch him.

O00oo00o0o0o0oo0o00o0o

She woke on the bed with an ice pack to the back of her neck. Dean lay a few inches from her appearing to be in a peaceful sleep. She knew better. Sam stood on an overturned wood crate spraying a massive devils trap on the ceiling covering the air vents. He looked toward her as she sat up. Damn her head throbbed, it felt as if her eyes were trying to pop out of her head.

"You aren't dead." she said lamely, pressing her hands over her eyes. "Good, now I can kick your lily white ass for dragging me into this mess."

"I can see you are feeling better. I assume you are the one who brought me around, I guess I need to thank you for that." Sam said, not looking away from his painting.

"Does everything want to kill you two? Demons, warlocks, anything else I can expect at my door in the next few minutes? Who elected you to be the monster fight squad anyway? Its insanity. Disembodied killer... smoke... mind controlling dead things! Seriously? I mean come on! Get a real job, get health insurance, get a 401K! Marry some x-model and make babies. I want you out of here! Pick up your brother and get the hell out!" "Don't look at me like that damn it, I mean it!"

"Are you done?" Sam said hopping off the crate.

"NO!"

"OK, you just let me know." Sam said

"Know what?" Kim said, standing up and yelling in Sam's face.

"You just let me know when your little tantrum is over. We have things to do so feel free to just get it out all now. We don't have time for all this."

"Oh my GOD, you are such an ass! I...I...I hate you, I hate you both, I wish I never met you! You are insane, your life is insane!

Kim picked up the nearest object, Dean's phone, and flung it at Sam. He caught it in mid air and placed it calmly back on the table.

"Done yet?" he said flatly. When she just stared, he continued. "Good. Tell me what you saw while I was unconscious, I want to make sure I haven't missed anything."

"You weren't unconscious you were dead damnit!"

"What did I miss?" he replied completely unimpressed by that bit of information.

"You were dead did you hear me? Dead!"

"I'm not deaf, I heard you the first time. I already thanked you."

"And that is just no big deal right, you were dead, now you are resuscitated and walking around like it just happens every day. You should be in a hospital not spray painting my ceiling. What if you have organ damage? What if I had been too late?"

"Dean wake up!" she said turning back to the bed. "Wake up damit!"

She rushed around to the side of the bed and shook Dean by the shoulders yelling. "Wake up damn it, Wake up!" " It was just a fever and its gone now, you are better so get up GET UP!"

Sam pulled her away from his brother and restrained her arms as she turned to swing at him. He pulled her wrists behind her back and restrained them in one hand as he pulled her against his chest. She began to cry in great gasping sobs. It only lasted a minute before she calmed and looked up at him.

"You cant die and leave me to handle this, please don't leave me here to handle this." She said.

O00o0o0o0o0oo

Sam checked Dean over. His heart was steady and he was breathing. HE dug his knuckles into his brother's breast bone and pressed to see if there was a reaction. No reaction to pain, Dean was out cold. Again. Kim had filled him in on the attack, and he knew that his brother saw him taken down by the warlock.. He wondered what there was left of him in there. Sam remembered all too well how easy it was to be dragged under by the weight of the past, by guilt and hallucinations. He pressed his palms against his eyes trying to hold back the memories rolling in to crush him. He pushed them back and silently thanked Castiel for lifting that burden from him.

There was so little information on warlocks. He found information back to Gaelic roots that suggested anti witchcraft spells should work, but he felt that this entity was older , too powerful. The oldest lore he found was Norse, where warlocks were known as spirit callers, or deceivers. That seemed to fit in more with what he had seen. It had called a demon, and it was messing with Dean's head more than casting spells. Spirit singer, oath breaker, the breaker of the perfect trust, all labels for conveyers of the craft that had taken the dark path. A witch gone from bad to worse.

He considered what it would take to stop a demon, a witch, an alpha of any number of species, and he decided he needed to trap it and bind it in its host body. That would let him try to stop it before it killed them or took Dean's sanity. He felt empathy for the man the being was wearing, but he would do what he had to do to protect his brother. Collateral damage just seemed to matter less to him now than when he was a wide eyed 23 year old.

He needed old books on the occult, but Bobby was gone and the libraries here weren't diverse enough. Searching the internet had offered too many conflicting opinions. This was too serious for guess work. He would search the web for information on the local Wicca and Pagan communities, maybe he could get leads from there.

He considered what to do with Dean. Things had gone from bad to worse. If he couldn't rouse him within the next few days he would have to make some decisions. He couldn't care for a catatonic man on the road. Certainly couldn't protect him. They had made hard decisions about Cas when he was in that state, but he couldn't imagine leaving his brother unprotected at a facility and just driving away.

The only option at this point was to find it, bind it, kill it, and hope his brother was strong enough to crawl out of the place he had retreated to.

"


	10. Chapter 10

The boy was protected, he didn't know how, but he couldn't get to him. He could feel the power of his suggestion swirl around him but not gather strength. He had no fear, no sorrow, no dread. It must be a spell, but no, there was no magic but his own. He probed more forcefully into his thoughts, but he found nothing but a gray quiet. He felt for a life force, he breathed, but he couldn't find his consciousness on earth or in hell. He needed to acquire Winchester's physical body to work a stronger spell but they had limited his access with paltry talismans and wards. No matter, he would make his own allies and Dean Winchester would finally pay.

O00oo0o0o0o000o0

_NEO VERITAS MAJIK. _Sam read the sign and shook his head before entering the dim corner shop behind a hardware store. A forty something robust bottle blonde met him just inside the door. She smiled at him and introduced herself as Cherisa, holding a hand out in greeting.

Sam shook her hand and her eyes flew to his face, horrified. She backed up putting a few feet between them and pulled a hex bag from her pocket holding it between them.

"Your kind is not welcome here, there is no Dark here only Light. How did you cross the circle?" She said.

Sam was stunned. He looked behind him and saw he had walked across an elaborate star of Solomon devil's trap. He turned to look back at the woman. He truly didn't have time for this.

"You think I'm a demon!." Sam said conifused.

"You are the Morning Star. Lucifer, Satan, call yourself whatever you want."

"If Lucifer were wearing me right now, do you really think I would care what you say? Look, my name is Sam, I am here looking for an old text on Norse lore. I need information on the old magic, thats all."

He took a flask out of his pocket and held it out to her. "Holy water." he said.

She took it and poured a small amount onto a stack of old shadow books. When the water hit there was a resounding hiss. "Your point?" she said to him, handing it back cautiously.,

He took the flask back and took a large swig. Her eyebrows raised in surprise. He was not a demon, he was not carrying Lucifer, but a black stain covered his aura.

"What are you?" she asked.

"I'm in a hurry, and I'm paying cash. Do you have what I'm looking for?" he said.

It took only minutes for her to hand him a heavily embossed leather book of Latin text. He thumbed through it, satisfied and pulled out his cash.

"No, this is not for sale, but you can copy what you want. You have a story, but you don't want to share it. You will be back to use the book again. We will talk then." She handed him a block of paper and a pen. He sat down and looked quickly through the book, getting frustrated.

The woman grabbed his hand and shut the book. He looked up at her and couldn't look away. She held her hand over the text. The books flew open and the pages fluttered and fell open to a short incantation surrounded by crude drawings. She looked away and he felt like he could breathe again. How he hated witches.

"I am not a witch, but that is a story for another day." she said going back to her sorting.

Sam finished up quickly and stood to leave. "Thanks." he said heading for the door. She tossed him her hex bag and he caught it. She walked closer to him and held out a talisman on a chain.

"For your partner. It will focus the positive, help him find his way home." "It could wake him, for a time, would that help you?"

o00o0o0o00o0o

The bartender knew he had to do it. It was right, it was necessary. He took the starter fluid and a lighter up the stairs to the first apartment on the left. He saturated the door and the rug under it before turning on the lighter and tossing it at the door. The door burst into flame. He turned and walked back downstairs to call the fire department. They had to know there was no emergency, it was all under control. It was a false alarm.

0oo0o0oo00o0o0o

She smelled smoke. Even before the smoke alarms went off she saw the flame creeping under the only door. She jumped on the bed and tried to shake Dean awake. No luck. Could she drag him to the window? God, where was Sam?

The wards on the inside of the door began to burn. A great blast of energy blew it into a hundred pieces. A rush of swirling air pushed into the room upsetting anything not tied down.

Kim locked an elbow through the headboard slats and wrapped her other arm desperately around Dean's chest as the maelstrom of wind attempted to suck him off the bed.

She could feel the presence in the room, but could not see Demon smoke or any form of corporeal spirit. The evil pulsated around them, the mere touch of its breath by her ear made her wince away from the malice it emanated.

Every door in the room shot open and slammed against the wall, the overhead bulbs exploded and sparks shot from the electrical outlets.

She could feel herself losing her grip on him. He began to slip from her grasp and in desperation she let go of the bed and wrapped her free arm around Dean's waist. They slid together from the bed and she clung to him as a presence dragged them closer to the burned door frame.

She heard someone slamming into the back hall before Dean was pulled from her. His body was lifted and flung against the wall, pinned there. He remained incoherent, suspended there until his brother burst into the room. He woke in the room but he could feel the memories of the pit pulling him back.

Dean's eyes shot open and met his brother's as he felt the first phantom meat hook pierce his shoulder. Relief poured over him. Sam was alive. Pain burst through that realization. Blood bloomed across his skin and flowed freely as the second hook pierced his side. A third anchored his thigh to the wall. He felt his arms and legs painfully pinned with unseen tethers. Visions of his first moments in hell crushed him, but along with the fear and the pain he suffered when he was first cast down, he had the knowledge of just how bad it could be. One day could feel like an eternity of torment.

Dean didn't cry out, he let the pain wash over him as penance for the sins he had committed during his last years in the pit. Sam shouldn't see him like this, because the screaming would come. He didn't want his brother's last memory of him too be like this. He wondered how long he would last before he gave in to the agony.

Sam fought to get to Dean but was rooted to the floor. He had served his time in the pit and knew where this would go. The bile raised in his throat as he saw the warlock begin to materialize between them. He had found the invocation to bind the powerful being to his host body, but he couldn't move or speak.

Kim huddled in the corner and watched blood stream from wounds across Dean's body. The wounds from ….what? , they just appeared like sick magic and bled. It wasn't right. Even with all the messed up crap she had learned over the last few days, watching someone pinned up like a butterfly and flayed without being so much as touchedshouldn't be possible. She looked at the being between the Winchester's and realized it probably wouldn't go down after being hit with salt or iron. The wards painted on the windows and doors had worked to protect them until the fire had burned through the door.

Why was Sam just standing there? She stared at him and saw the strain on his face as he struggled but was held immobile. She could move, she flexed her hand and pushed herself back against the wall. She looked down at her forearm at the drawn sijils Sam had put there. Could those few simple lines scribbled on her be protection from its power? She edged her arm up and felt the anti possession talisman hung around her neck. It was crazy, but all of this was.

She reached into her pocket and felt for the marker she had used on the walls. At the moment the warlock had either thought her subdued, dead or disregarded her. She could use that to their advantage. They wouldn't die here, at least not easy. A plan began to form in her mind.

0o0o0o0o00o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0 o

The memory was too strong, it pulled at his consciousness and he had to let go. There was too much going on at once. He couldn't focus.

Dean was in the deepest chamber in the pit. The walls wept molten lava. A young man on the wrack cried like a child. Blood and gore soaked the floor around his feet. This was the third round after all, and the boy was made whole again, a blank canvas for Dean's warped imagination.

He saw himself walk to the man, leaning painfully close to whisper some unknown taunt into his ear. The man met Dean's eyes as he raised his razor to caress it down his cheek to his neck. He saw himself slide the blade slowly into the man's skin below a tattoo of Jesus on the man's chest, carving a path around it.

"Blasphemy," he heard himself whisper. "We can't have that now, can we?" He reached into the cut and slowly peeled back the skin. The man screamed as the image was pulled away with a sickening shurp.

Dean remembered now, just as he remembered the others he had relived. He remembered the man, the pleasure of drawing screams from him. So many souls. He had done this.

As soon as the memory reformed in his mind he found himself in a new chamber, with a new soul. More of the same but always different. How many torments did he devise over those last ten years in hell? Allistair had trained him how to cause pain, but he himself had reveled in bringing forth the dread, prolonging the anticipation of the next slice. How had he forgotten?

This time he saw a woman staring back at him, she smiled as he brandished his weapon of choice. She was from magic, these were always the hardest to break, he saw himself smile in anticipation. Allistair paced the room hovering over Deans every move, drawing sick pleasure from the turn of his apprentice's thoughts. He raised his blade and stopped, this one was different...and it all became clear.

The pieces fell in place as the scene played itself out in his mind. The bound souls, housed in that body. This was the man at the warehouse, this was the warlock in the room. He knew with a certainty that they had killed his demon. This was why he was targeted. He could feel the pure pulsing need for vengeance in the air multiplied a thousand times over by grief and anger. It wouldn't just take him, Sam and Kim would pay too. It would be his fault, another black mark on his already mangled soul.

"I laughed as we burned her to a cinder, " Dean said, smiling at the warlock, intentionally drawing the all the attention and anger toward himself.

The warlock reacted as if he was slapped. He slid to Dean and placed his left hand on the man's chest. Dean sucked in a breath as he felt his skin begin to blister and burn under its palm.

Kim crawled forward and silently stood behind Sam. She attempted to pull a sleeve up to expose any amount of skin on him, the arm wasn't working thanks to her shaking hands and a stubborn button. She lifted the back of his shirts up exposing a strip of bare skin, uncapped the marker with her teeth and began to copy the wards from her arm to Sam's back.

Sam could feel Kim behind him pulling at his arm He wanted to tell her to run, that he couldn't help her, but he couldn't move. His eyes were locked on his brother struggling for breath. He felt her pull his shirt up and felt the marker dragging against his skin and he was totally baffled. Dean's taunt had drawn the warlock's attention away from them, if she ran there was a chance she could save herself. She dropped his shirt and began searching through his pockets, pulling out the paper with the binding incantation.

Sam felt an electric tingle pass through him as he began to regain control of his limbs. He felt the demon knife pressed into his hand and held there until he could grip it on his own. Kim begin to quietly chant the verse she held, and he was free to move.

Dean gasped against the urge to scream, he felt like his blood was on fire, eating him away until he was hollow inside. His skin sizzled under the touch. He stared into the warlocks face as he felt his heart skip a beat. Panic welled up as he felt it again, a longer pause with nausea welling over him before it begin to beat slowly and erratically. He couldn't catch his breath, the world seemed to tint gray and tilt. He broke eye contact and thought he saw Sam advancing on them as his vision faded to black.


	11. Chapter 11

The warlock felt himself solidifying into the body of Simon Keller. His strength diminished to that of a mortal human, and he lost his grip on his victim. Dean fell heavily to the ground as the warlock struggled to pull free of the restraining body of his vessel but he was firmly caught. His senses diminished to those of a human, he squinted at the lack of color and cringed at the fact he needed to breathe to exist.

He spun to see the younger Winchester stalking toward him, and in an instant he knew his options were limited. He dove for the woman. All her attention was focused on the hex she read. They apparently valued her in some fashion, and he would use that to his advantage.

He wrapped his arm around her neck pulling her off balance and pressed a sharp metal shard from the burned door frame against her throat, drawing just enough blood to show he was in control.

Sam stopped in his tracks as he saw Kim's eyes widen in shock. The spell dropped from her hand and floated slowly to the ground. Their eyes met and Sam saw her expression change from shock to anger to steely calm.

Sam could see what she was thinking, but before he could voice the "NO" forming on his lips, she twisted away from the weapon. She spun the man, sharply inverting his wrist as she brought her arm down cleanly snapping his elbow. He dropped with a wail and she felt the satisfaction of kicking him in the ribs before Sam pushed her aside to lift the man by his hair.

"Let my brother go." Sam said, reaching for the man's throat.

Kim dropped next to Dean to look at his wounds, but as horrific as they had originally appeared they seemed to be superficial and already healing. She ran for a bottle of peroxide and poured it over Deans chest, washing away the blood. A spattering hit his chest and she realized it was her own. She brushed it away without a second thought. Dean was breathing, his heart beat was steady, but he was again in an unnatural sleep. She rolled him onto his side and took off her hoodie to cover him with it. It looked ridiculously small and out of place draped across him. She wondered fleetingly of she would ever see the man awake for more than a few minutes at a time.

Sam dug his hand into the man's fractured elbow with a malicious smile, imagining what his brother had been put through. He turned his head toward Dean and saw Kim leaning over him, again, but this time he caught sight of Kim's blood slowly dripping onto his brother's bare chest. Without thought his fist landed squarely against the warlocks jaw.

O00o0o0oo0o0o0o0o

Dean was back in the quiet place. He could feel air, or was it water, drifting around him, soothing his muscles. Whispered voices hung in the background. He kept them there. A cold rush hit his chest but it wasn't unpleasant. It just was.

His body rolled bonelessly to his side and he considered opening his eyes to see whose hands were on him. He decided against it. His work was done, his penance was done, he liked this place where he drifted between sleep and wake. He realized he always liked it, those few seconds of floating before slipping into a dream. He would just stay here. The world would go on without him, after all no one was indispensable.

0oo0o00o0o0o00o00o

Simon woke on tied to a chair. He suddenly thought of himself as Simon because he was limited by the man. The last warlock wearing the last vessel capable of holding one. Here he was, here they were, tied to a chair in a room above a bar. Demeaning, infuriating! His vessel was damaged, it had been near death for years thanks to the rough use he had put it to, but now he knew when he pulled from the man, there would be no going back. He could not inhabit a corpse.

He closed his eyes and tried to call to a demon, any demon to inhabit the body while he pulled out to vivisect the younger Winchester. The thought brought a pleased grimace to his face. He forced the bones to slowly realign and knit together in his arm.

No demon answered his call.

He saw Sam lift his brother onto the bed in the center of the room. For all intents and purposes the man was dead. His body lived but his mind was gone. He would love to carve the tattoo from the man's chest and slide into him. If he could host an archangel he could certainly hold a warlock. What a magnificent vessel Dean Winchester would make. He would make it happen.

He could start a dynasty in that vessel. Plans twisted in his head. No one saw the satisfied smile creep across his face.

He felt a cold dread pass over him as Sam pulled a charm out of his pocket. He hoisted his brother into a sitting position and dropped the cord around his neck. When the pewter talisman hit the man's chest he felt shards of the old magic fill the room.

He wouldn't have it. The old magic was gone forever, he had crushed it himself. It just couldn't be.


	12. Chapter 12

Dean felt a warm tingle penetrate the haze he cocooned himself in. He tried to push it back, curl in on himself to avoid it but it persisted. The feeling became stronger and he found it harder to turn away. There was no word for what hovered on the edge of his consciousness. It was something curious and peaceful. He began to think he wanted to know this feeling. It invoked memories of his mother, of the first time he held his baby brother. He felt the memory of his father carrying him on his shoulders as a toddler roll over him. He remembered what it felt to get under a warm electric blanket on a freezing cold night. He let it in.

o0o0o0o0o0o

Kim watched as Sam hovered over the defiant man tied to a chair. He had taken more than his fair share of abuse, but refused to tell them how to free Dean. She tossed around the word torture in her head, but then disregarded it. The bastard had it coming, and Sam would do whatever it took. As it should be. She smiled as she realized how quickly she became desensitized to all this craziness. What Iraq didn't do in nine months the Winchesters had done in a week.

She grabbed Dean by the wrists and hoisted him into a sitting position and slid a loose white t-shirt over his head. She reached her hand into the arm hole to pull his hand through. She was out of breath before she managed to cover him and ease him back onto the pillow. She hoped getting the sweat pants on would be easier, but she doubted it.

It had taken nearly two hours to clean the bloody disaster left from their last confrontation. The wall was back to its dingy beige, the floor was clean of blood stains, the bed was made. Dean even looked better .

She tipped his head back to look into his eyes. She had to wonder, was Dean's state totally supernatural? She was no psych nurse, but she had seen men, just a few, who had "checked out" after a battle. She remembered one in particular that was catatonic for nearly a week after they rescued him from insurgents.

This week had been crazy, but more for her than the boys. This was their normal. She wondered if something had happened to Dean that could make him shut down. She would ask Sam about it after he was...done...with the warlock.

She brushed Dean's hair back with her hand. She didn't need to, it was short enough to be tidy. It was an affectionate gesture, she realized, stopping herself. When did that happen?

0oo0o00oo0o0

He had almost forgotten what it was like. Someone having the power to inflict human pain on him with no recourse. Humans did have an extraordinary ability to suffer. Being trapped in this one was becoming tedious. The pain fueled his rage, that gave him power. He stored it up and reveled in it, planning how to exact revenge ten fold on them all. The woman would be first. He felt another crushing blow to his jaw and would have smiled if his face wasn't so swollen.

They cared for the older Winchester as if he were a child. It was hilarious really. They blamed him for his state, so he wasn't shielded due to a spell on their part. If his mind was gone all the better. he still had plans for what was left.

He feigned unconsciousness, hoping to search for any weakness in their plan.

A solid knock sounded at the door.

"Mom?" he heard yelled around the board propped over the mangled doorway. He almost smiled as he caught sigh of the woman's shocked face as she turned to the Wincheter boy. Oh yes, he could use this.


	13. Chapter 13

Sam grabbed the back of the chair and dragged it into the side bedroom. He quickly gagged the man in and ran back for the salt to draw a circle around him. There would be no surprises on the demon front if he could help it.

"Mom, we are coming in." they heard a second voice say as Kim scrambled off the bed.

"Hold on, I'll let you in, just give me a sec." Kim said in a cheery voice. She felt as if she was going to puke. How could she have forgotten, even for a minute, that they were due back today? She was the worst mother in history.

Sam quietly closed the bedroom door and walked to lift the barricade away from the burned door. As soon as the wood was moved three girls pushed their way in, each scanning the room after looking at their mom. There was a man a bed in the middle of the parlor. Not a good start.

"What the hell is going on Mom, are you trying to give us a heart attack?" the tallest girl said.

"Perhaps you'd care to rephrase that young lady." Kim said, easily slipping into mother mode.

"Mom, we get home, the house is unlocked, there is a water bottle on the floor and bloody scrub pants on the table, all the food in the fridge is rotten and there is a weeks worth of mail inside the door."

"The neighbors haven't seen you in a week, but they heard through the grapevine you took off with some boy toy young enough to be your son. Some foreigner."

Three sets of eyes turned to Sam,who was looking mildly embarrassed but, as usual, startlingly handsome.

"I'm not that young." Sam said pasting on a quirky smile.

"I'll take two of those." the girl whispered into her sisters ear with a smile.

An uncomfortable thirty seconds of silence hung in the air. It felt like a week.

"Girls, this is ….Connie." Kim said awkwardly. "Connie these are my daughters Kelly, Raine and Harley."

"There is a bed in the living room Mom, with a guy in it. Why is there a bed in the living room? Why are you here? I thought you weren't gonna rent these apartments." "Oh my GOD! What kind of satanic crap is drawn all over the walls?"

One of the girls wandered over to glance at the man in the bed. She caught sight of Dean's face and turned a startled glance to her mother.. "You hit the jackpot didn't you." she said, not at all amused. She poked his arm and he didn't move. She poked it again and then lightly shook him. "Hey." she said.

"Cut it out Kelly. That is Connie's brother Dean." (_fast thinking on the fake name, she thought to herself) "_He isn't going to wake up so leave him alone. Head injury. Quit poking at him."

"He looks to me like he is waking up." she said.

Sam walked quickly to the bedside as Dean's head turned on the pillow. His breathing hitched and he let out a quiet sigh before he was still again.

"Go downstairs and get us a table girls, we'll talk." Kim said with finality.

"Why don't we just go home." Kelly said.

"Table. Now."

The three girls filed out and headed down the stairs. Kim sat on the edge of the bed and rested her face in her hands. Her options were limited, she had to lie. She would get her story straight with Sam and then continue to destroy nineteen years of honesty between her and her daughters. She only felt a slight pang of guilt. There was no way to explain any of this. She would make do.

0oo0o00o0o0o

Sam checked his prisoner before returning to his brother's bedside. Dean had dark circles under his eyes, but he looked peaceful. He shook him gently and waited for a reaction.

Nothing.

"Dean. Hey Dean get up. You just missed three hot teenagers drooling over you. A set of twins an a spare. You know how you love twins." he said, glad that Kim hadn't heard that little speech.

"We've got him Dean. The warlock. He can't hurt anyone. Just squeeze my hand if you hear me. Come on, you can do it." He paused and waited. Nothing. "We need to move on, if you don't get up I'm gonna have to drive. I swear I am gonna put Yanni on, then Taylor Swift."

Sam sensed the slightest movement around Dean's mouth, but couldn't be sure. On impulse he covered his brother's mouth and pinched his nose shut, waiting for him to struggle away for air. He let go when Dean's face reddened but he didn't try to turn away. He felt anger building inside him again and headed back to the prisoner. He would find out how to wake his brother one way or another.

0oo0o0oo00o0o0o

"Connie is a friend who is in trouble, he is going through a lot right now. I need a couple of days here with them then I will be home. They aren't staying, but while they are here they need me. Discussion closed."

"Mom, I called your work looking for you. They said you no call no showed last night. You have them scared, they were going to file a missing person's report if the couldn't reach you. Where is your cell? Whats really going on? We have volunteered at the hospice since we were in middle school. Something is not right with the guy in the bed. Give us a little credit."

"You haven't dated since Dad died." the second girl began. "Are you...with that guy? I mean, we don't know him at all but what is he , maybe thirty? I mean he is pretty and all, no one can deny that, but if you are going to get into something I hope its for more than just his body."

"And his face." another girl added

"Girls," Kim said, "I am not with anyone, but even if I chose to move on, you need to remember that I am a grown woman not just a Mom. I let Nat at the pharmacy think he was with me because she is a nosy witch and she was looking at him like he was a hunk of sirloin. It isn't Christian of me to say but I can't stand that woman."

"As for Dean, he is a sad case at this point. Connie needs to make some decisions on his behalf. Just imagine if one of you were in that state and we had to decide how to care for you. Have a little compassion."

"So what about the walls, are you suddenly into witchcraft or is he some kinda wacko?"

"The apartment was broken in to and I found it like that. I can't paint over it until they leave." she said with a straight face.

Kim knew that this conversation was going to go on and on. She called over the waitress and ordered them food, preparing for the inquisition to come.

O0o0o0o00o0o

"There is no spell on your brother." the warlock said, oozing blood from a cut at his hairline.

"I don't believe you." Sam said through his teeth.

"Yet that changes nothing. The hell he is in is of his own making. This end is far too sweet. He punishes himself exquisitely no doubt. He knows what he has done and how he should pay. All that guilt, festering for these past years. He, as a master of torment himself, can truly make every millisecond stretch for hours. How I wish I could witness it...can you imgine? Oh, I see that you can." he said with an evil chuckle, watching Sam seethe.

"If you didn't do this then I guess I don't need you. Say goodbye Simon." Sam turned to pick up his blade but as he lifted it he saw the warlock pass control to the man. Human eyes looked up at him in confusion as he grimaced in pain.

"Why?" a thin reedy voice whispered.

"DAMNIT!" Sam said tossing the blade against the wall.


	14. Chapter 14

Sam paced the room weighing his options. He paused to look at his brother and was clueless as to how to help him. Kim walked into the room through the gaping doorway and handed Sam some food. He paused just a second before sitting down to eat. She pulled a pint of Fireball whiskey out of her bag and took a swig straight from the bottle before she handed it to him. He took a long swig, looked at the label and took another. It was that kind of night.

"Has he come around?" she said

"No." Sam said lapsing into silence as he ate.

"Look Sam I've been thinking. Is there any chance that Dean is having...well, an acute stress reaction, and that is why he isn't...himself?"

"Are you asking me if Dean is having a nervous breakdown? No, he isn't. He has been through worse than this and come out of it fine. There has to be another answer." Sam looked up from his plate when she didn't respond. "What? I know my brother. You just met him, trust me, if he was going to be crazy it would have been about four years ago. This is a spell or a hex, maybe a curse."

"Do you hear yourself? You are the only two people in the world who would believe something like that even if it IS true." She shot back.

"Every hunter sees things like this. Its what we do. If you cant handle it you leave the life or end up dead."

"Wait, are you telling me there are more of you? That there is some kind of club of you people? You call yourself hunters. What do you hunt? Everything not …..normal? How many of you are out there? Do you communicate? Is there a leader or something? How come no one knows about you?

"Its not a club. We are...independent contractors. Its a life choice. Usually its passed on, through families but some hunters are made by negative experiences. One of our best friends became a hunter when his wife was possessed . Another hunter we knew turned to the life when his sister was taken by vampires. Our Dad became a hunter when our mother was torched by a demon. She was a hunter, so were her parents. They are all dead now. That's just the way it seems to go."

"Why don't you run, leave the life? She said.

"We both tried. It didn't work. We were born to be what we are. We make a difference."

Kim leaned on the wall, shocked into silence. All this time she spent with them and this had never come up. She thought she would make a difference when she joined the army. Their life was exponentially more dangerous, and it was thankless. How amazing they were. She wondered if they knew.

"What made him wake up the last few times. Maybe we can find a pattern." She said sitting with Sam, eyeing him with new respect.

O00o0o0o00o0o

As the vessel woke he pushed his way to the surface. He threw his head back and tried to claw his way into Dean's consciousness. He could feel the old magic surrounding him. There was no chance.

He turned his thoughts back to the woman's visitors. He remembered a name. Kelly. She would be the one. He called with his mind for a demon. When none heard him he called louder, he sang in his head to entice them to come, he compelled whoever heard him to turn to his call.

He felt the chair he was in begin to shake with his effort. He felt a tendril of his mind wrap around a demon. He was close. He was viscous. Perfect.

He fed instructions to him and he felt the demon turn to the task. The windows of the room he was in exploded out into the street. It was done.


	15. Chapter 15

"Mom is so crazy right now, its gotta be a mid life crisis or something."

"Right? I mean, staying with that Connie guy at the bar? What kind of name is that anyway? I mean, what kind of mother pops out a kid and says...he looks like a Connie, lets call him that. HAH Connie my ass."

So are we gonna sit here and bash mom all night or what? We are all just pissed that our mother is across town with hot guy and coma boy, who is also hot in case you didn't notice, while we are here eating Ben and Jerry's and watching Venture Brothers.

"I give up, I'm going to bed, dibs on the bathroom." Kelly said, dumping the empty container of Cherrie's Garcia in the trash on the way by.

"Ugh, she takes forever in there." Harley said to herself.

"Like you don't? You are the other half of the matched set after all. I haven't seen hot water in there since you two were born" her sister replied.

O00o00o0o

Kelly tied her hair back and reached for her tooth brush. She popped her earbuds in and turned her iPod to shuffle, Muse blared at her as she grabbed the toothpaste.

Looking in the mirror she thought she saw the window behind her vibrate. She paused and rinsed her mouth wondering when the wind had kicked up. So weird the flash storms she had heard about while they were gone. Whatever.

She reached for her towel but her eyes were drawn back to the window. An intense feeling of dread poured over her as she watched the window shake. She reached up to pull her earbuds out and was stunned by the noise of the window shaking. She stood, should she run? No, don't be silly. She thought.

She turned to head for the door as a tendril of grey smoke burst under the window frame. She opened her mouth to scream and it shot down her throat. It felt like a mixture of ice water and fire for the split second before the demon pushed her down to take control.

0o0o00o0o0o

"Oh my God, Kelly." Harley said as panic gripped her chest. She climbed over the back of the couch and ran up the stairs. "Kelly! What's wrong!." she yelled.

"What? Nothing, go away!" she heard as a reply.

"Open the door!" She yelled as her older sister came up behind her to see what was going on.

Harley began to pound on the door, she knew something was horribly wrong. It was a twin thing. Either someone was in there with her or she was hurt...something bad, something awful.

The door flung open and the sisters eyes met. "WHAT!" Kelly yelled.

"Uhhhhhhhhhhh...are you OK? I mean, it felt like something was...like you were hurt or scared or something." Harley said feeling a bit stupid.

"Are you done?" Kelly replied.

Her sister pushed past her and looked around the bathroom and into the shower. "Do you MIND?" Kelly shot at her, shoving her toward the door.

"Sorry, I just, well, I was worried."

Kelly slammed the door in her sister's face. The demon inside her wondered if the sister needed to be eliminated. Psychic connections among humans were rare, but powerful. He looked down at the body he inhabited. Young, healthy, attractive enough by human standards. It would do. The plan was already set after all. After he was done...he was sure he could find many amusing thing to do in this body.

0oo0o00o0o0o

The demon climbed out the second story window and slid into her sister's car. He could feel the girl trying to bust out but he pushed her back down.

Kill the mother, then the younger Winchester. He would let the older one linger, just long enough.


	16. Chapter 16

Dean drifted. He was aware of brief snippets of conversations, an occasional feeling would slide past him, he had independent thought, to a degree. He knew he was Sam's brother. He loved his brother. He felt hungry. If he let himself he could rise up out of the comfort to eat, but no, he would never be that hungry.

A cool cloth passed over him, his face and neck. It was comforting. He turned toward it, or did he.

He could vaguely feel hell throbbing below him, and the world his body was in hovering to his left. Something else glowed to his right. He wouldn't choose. He was just fine where he was.

The nondescript thrumming of voices echoed in the distance. At times he could tell one was Sam. There was no urgency in the tone.

Serenity. In a place that he can hide. HAH lyrics, to something. He couldn't place it.

They were over him, the conversation was more heated. He wouldn't listen. For thousands of years civilization went on with no Dean Winchester, and it would go on once he was gone. Ashes to ashes, Dust in the Wind, There once was a man from...wait. That's funny. Was it? He didn't laugh, no one laughed, but he was silently calmly amused. They couldn't hear him because they were there and he was here.

He would consider that, maybe.

He reached his mind out to the conversation close to him. Sam and that woman, spatting. He didn't like her because... he was quite sure he just didn't. She was pushy, that was it. All ordeeres and opinions. She could go now. She was making noise in his comfortable quiet space.

He really wanted a cheeseburger. There it was again, he was hungry. It nagged at him, becoming an annoyance. It was the second annoyance he could remember in his quiet place. That woman and the hunger.

His face was touching something, a sheet or a blanket...and it was too hot. He should turn over. The sheets would be cooler if he turned.

For the first time, he tried to move his body. Just a bit. He expected to flip over and drift back onto his nirvana state of existence.

Nothing moved.

He tried again, putting a bit of effort into it this time.

Nothing.

He felt suddenly really warm, and really hungry. Why didn't they stop spatting so he could concentrate! God Sam was whiny, what the heck are they arguing over. Its loud. "My God would you two take it outside?" he said, but he didn't. No sound came out. His mouth didn't move. He couldn't move his head. Wait, he couldn't move anything.

Oh no freaking way. He was getting up and he wanted three cheeseburgers and a bottle of Jack...and PIE damnit. Oh geez he needed to hit the can too.

"Sam, sit me up." "SAM!"

The argument went on around him but no one heard him call.

Now he was pissed.

o00o00o0o0oo0o

"I need to go Sam, but you can stay here I told you that. I need to go back to the girls and I need to go back to work. I can't believe I didn't show up to my last shift, you know how bad that is for a nurse? I didn't even THINK of work, it didn't even enter my mind. Demons, warlocks, spells...THAT entered my mind. My daughters barging into all this and being exposed to this supernatural bull shit, its not happening."

"It's OK Kim, we appreciate your help, I fully understand." Sam said with a sigh, almost believing it. "I will call some people, get something lined up." He silently wondered who.

"So, am I safe now? If you leave? Is it safe for me to go home, live my life, send my daughters back to school or will they have targets on their back?" "Can I wash this crap off my arm finally?"

Sam looked down,, surprised to see the warding sijils still in sharpie on her forearm.

"I didn't realize they were still there. Wait, why didn't you wash them off?"

She walked around Sam's back and lifted his shirt. "Yours are there too, on your back." Why would I wash them off, it kept the bastards off of me. Worked way better on me than they did on the wall." She said to Sam.

Sam rummaged through his bag and pulled out his old anti possession necklaces Bobby had given them years before. He hung one around Kim's neck. She picked up the talisman and looked at it. She still wore the first one he gave her, now another. Awesome.

"Anti possession, from Demons. Give the girls each one. I will finish this all before I take off with Dean. I will do my best to leave you safe. "

"Tell me the truth Sam, how many of the people who "helped" you ended up dead." She said.

He paused. "Some. I cant lie to you, but I know more now an I will make you all as safe as I can."

"Oh my God can this get any worse?" She yelled.

She turned her eyes to Dean, he was hyperventilating. Sweat beaded on his brow, he clutched at the sheet under him. Slowly a furrow of concentration formed between his eyes. He looked like he was having pain, she could still treat that.

"Same old drill Sam. Crush three off the Vicodin I have left and dissolve it in the whiskey will you" I'm gonna wash the syringe out and we will get him comfortable. He probably needs cleaning up too. If you'll help me sit him up Ill give him the med and you can go downstairs and bring us up some food. Make your calls while you are at it. I have a shift tomorrow at 7PM, and I need to be there.

Sam shook his head as he bashed the pills into a powder. She was used to giving orders, but he wasn't used to taking them. She came out of the bathroom shaking out the syringe and he pulled Dean by his wrists into a sitting position so she could slide in behind him, supporting his back against her chest. He filled the oral syringe with the medicine and he watched her tip Dean's head into her neck to support him as she slowly eased the concoction into his mouth. He gagged and sputtered, but he swallowed slowly. Sam left her there to get the food and make his calls. He dreaded calling Garth, but he may be their only option.

O00o0o0o0o0o

Kelly, no the demon, arrived at the bar and looked at the odd reflection in the glass door as she entered. She saw Sam head behind the counter into the kitchen. Connie. For some reason that name popped into his head. That was Sam Winchester. He was almost honored to be the one to send him back to hell.

She followed him into the kitchen, smiling at people he/she should know. He watched the man talk to a burly cook who bagged up some awful smelling cooked animal in a brown paper sack. Savages. She picked up a long thin knife from the counter and palmed it against her thigh.

"Kell! Nice to see your lovely face again, the cook said. You're out late, what can I get for you?" The jovial man said.

:"Just here to see my mother. I'll head up with Sam. Nice to see you." The demon said dismissively.

"I'm just heading up now, your mom is giving Dean some medicine." Sam said.

He led the way up the stairs to the room and put the food down to lift the devastated door out of the way so they could enter.

"I'm gonna get that fixed", he said sheepishly.

The two walked in on her mom humming How Great Thou Art to Dean, still draped across her chest with his head tucked into her neck.

"Touching." The demon said in a snide voice.

"Kelly! Whats going on? Is everything OK?" She looked at Sam and he shrugged, throwing the food on the table.

"I followed your boyfriend up so we could chat. Well one of your boyfriends."

"I told you all that Connie is a friend." Kim said, aggravated.

Sam paused, wait, something was wrong, she had called him Sam in the kitchen. Oh my God, it was too late. It had gotten to

Sam tensed and turned to Kim's daughter as she smiled and slid her knife between his ribs.


	17. Chapter 17

She smiled as he gripped the handle and stepped back. Sam looked down at the blood welling over his hand as the girl turned away and walked toward the bed.

"Sam?" Kim said, seeing him stagger back. She didn't see the blood until her daughter stepped away from him.

Simon sat in the adjacent room, head thrown back, seeing the tableau played out through the demon's eyes. He let out a bark of laughter when he felt the knife slide into the Winchester boy. How lovely the shock was on his face. The look on the mother was priceless. Oh if he could just drag this out for days he would. No time though. He wanted Dean to himself for a while and this was the quickest way.

The demon strolled in and looked at the mother. He itched to jump into Dean's body, he was an angel vessel after all. He felt the protection of the mark on the man's chest from half a room away.. There was magic around his neck too. There was no way. Pity.

The devil's trap at the door had been broken, but the one over the bed on the ceiling was partially obscured by smoke damage but intact. The demon strolled right into it, his single minded purpose causing him to be reckless. It was caught, unaware, in the circle. If Kim could just pull Dean out he would be safe, but his weight was pressing her to the headboard.

Kim stared dumbfounded when her daughter's eyes clouded over pitch black. The smile was not one natural to her, it was hollow and malicious.

"Oh Mommy, come give us a hug". The demon snickered climbing over the foot of the bed crawling up to lean over Dean to kiss her mother on the cheek.

"So kind, taking pity on him. Do you know how many people want him dead? Well, not exactly people, but close enough. Don't you think?"

Kim had nowhere to go. She shifted Deans weight off of her and he rolled limply to the edge of the mattress landing on his belly with an arm pinned beneath him.

"Kelly? Its ok honey, we will get it out...oh my God GET OUT OF MY DAUGHTER!" Kim said, losing all control.

Sam dropped to his knees and pulled the knife out of his side slowly. He covered the bleed with his palm and launched into a fluent rapid Latin exorcism.

"STOP", an inhuman masculine voice screamed from Kelly. It spun angrily and jumped off the bed to confront Sam when the demon realized it was trapped. Sam closed his eyes and steadily continued his chant.

In the other room no one could hear the warlock bellowing in frustration.

O0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

Dean was floating, listening to a song. It was nice. He didn't thing a lot of things were nice but this was nice. A hymn. He remembered from Pastor Jim's church. He didn't remember the words, but the melody floated through him. The thrumming of hell in the back of his consciousness eased away and he vaguely felt arms around him, supporting him in a comforting, almost maternal way. He felt himself melting into it.

The humming stopped and he felt the arms around him tighten. He didn't like it. Something had changed. He felt himself roll onto his stomach and the arms were gone, just like the music. It was colder, and something was wrong. He felt a charm digging into his chest. It was sharp and annoying. There was no comfort here.

Dean heard his brothers sharp intake of breath followed by the rhythmic chant of an exorcism. Sam was hurt. He felt it. The only time he rushed it like that was when something was very wrong.

He tried to open his eyes, but he was so disconnected to his body. If he could hear and he could feel he could help his brother. His eyes felt gritty and his vision was blurred when he dragged his eyelid open.

He looked up and saw that woman again. She was pulling the sheet off the bed with him on it. The sheet slid free and he felt himself hit the floor with a solid thump.

"Oww! GEEZ lady!" He said trying to reach up to hold his aching head.

Sam paused for a split second when he heard his brother's voice and opened his eyes. He knew the look on his brother's face, he was pissed. He smiled and continued his chant.

The demon turned and saw the woman outside the circle. She had managed to get Dean almost all the way out of the circle when it launched itself at him and grabbed his leg.

"I will kill them both before I let you win, do you hear me?" the demon hissed at Sam.

The exorcism was taking its toll on the demon's hold. Kelly began to reach for control with every distraction. She could hear her mother calling, she could hear the chanting, but she could also hear a voice inside the demon. She knew it was directing its every move.

She looked down through her own eyes and saw her hands gripping a mans ankle. She let go and he slid away. She dropped to her knees as she spewed out foul black smoke. She leaned forward and vomited before her mother grabbed her by the shirt and yanked her out of the circle.

Kim ignored Dean and hugged her daughter.

"Stay right there, DONT MOVE!" Kim said to her before crawling over to Sam.

"How bad? She said lifting his hand away and laying him on the floor.

"I've had worse." Sam said before promptly passing out.


	18. Chapter 18

The warlock could feel Dean wake. He thrust his mind at him attempting to take hold, tear into just a tiny spot where he could bury himself. His plan had failed. He hadn't even considered it could happen. The demon he had called had been perfect for the task. It had been born of hell not of a twisted human soul. How clearly he could see through his eyes. Pure evil. Beautiful, like his beloved.

His anger fueled his strength. His human body shook the chair violently and he felt it begin to creak as the arms loosened from the back. He would have his vengeance. He would have it now.

O00o0o00o

Kim wrapped Sams ribcage and he pulled his bloody shirt back over his head. She didn't say a word. After all, what was there to say. She agreed to help them, she owned that decision, but to involve her kids? No, That was never part of the deal.

Dean remained awake. He sat next to Kim's daughter on the floor with his back propped against the bed. He tried to talk to her, just once, but she looked away staring at the wards and symbols on the walls. He was was afraid to close his eyes. He felt this was real, that he was going to stay. He felt groggy, but solid.

He knew he was here, wherever here was, and that the young girl had been possessed. He recognized the face of an angry mother on Kim. It reminded him of Ellen when she found out they had taken Joe on a hunt. He knew that an angry mother was nothing to take lightly, and this one was no different.

Dean dragged himself up to a standing position. He tried to take a step but sat down quickly. His head was spinning. Damn he was hungry. Too much information, too many sensations all at once. He closed his eyes and started again. room but no one seemed to see his distress. IT was alright, he could handle it.

He watched Kim huddle down next to her daughter and speak quietly into her ear. The girl was in another world for a moment before she swung her eyes to Dean.

"This is your fault. You did this to us." she stated calmly

o00o0o0o0o0o0

Kelly sat on the floor near coma boy. She couldn't think of him as that any more she supposed, since he seemed mostly awake. He tried to speak to her, she supposed to he tried to be comforting or charming or whatever a man who looks like that does. Ya, she had no interest in hearing him talk. She wished he would just disappear.

She had just felt that THING leave her body. It felt like she was trying to vomit out her feet. It turned her inside out. She was pushing at it from inside so hard that she felt she would follow it right out of her body, but she didn't. She remembered what it was planning, what it was thinking, and the other mind prodding it. It was like two layers of evil. She knew if she peeled away the one calling the shots the one underneath would be just as foul, just as cruel. The only difference was the motive. She tried to sort out the pieces in her mind.

It fell into place all at once. Her mom said it was a demon, possessing her. She knew for certain that that the demon, or whatever entity had forced itself into her was possessed by a stronger entity.

She remembered it all. It wanted the man next to her to suffer, but that wasn't enough. It wanted to torment him for eternity. She turned to him and was stunned what came out her mouth. "This is your fault, you did this to us." The words were hers but the thoughts were not.

The look of shock and guilt on the man's face was fleeting but genuine. He opened his mouth to speak, but decided better of it. He stood and walked unsteadily away. She wanted to apologize but, screw it, these two had dragged her family into this insanity. Her Dad was dead, all they had was their Mom. They couldn't have her.

She needed to call her home. She needed to drag her mother out of this place. Oh God, what if that thing had made her hurt her sisters like it intended to hurt her mother. Would it come back?

Wait, she could feel it, it was still close. Her eyes swung to the closed door across the room. It was there, she felt it. Connie's brother... (she knew now he wasn't Connie,) had gotten up and stumbling to the door. He could barely walk, but he was heading right for it. Couldn't he feel it? Couldn't any of them?

"DON'T!" she yelled as he flung open the door.

O00o0o0o0o0o0

Dean staggered into the back bedroom just in time to see the warlock shaking itself free from his bonds. Their eyes met, and Dean remembered it all. He could see the true face of the warlock manipulating the man in front of him. He remembered the feeling of its blood leaking between his fingers as he tore him apart in hell over and over. He felt no shame. He did it. It was over.

Sam stood and bracing side and tried to follow Dean, but the door slammed itself shut. No force in the world was going to open that door. Kim tried to throw her weight against it with Sam but it was as if it was made of stone.

Kelly stood and walked to the door.

"Its going to kill him, then it is going to kill us." She said matter of factly. "Not just us Mom, the whole family, everyone in the bar...then the people like him." Kelly said pointing to Sam.

"I know it mom. Even if we run it will find us, if someone helps us, they are dead too. I can still remember how it thinks. Is it the devil?" She said to her mother.

Her eyes were drawn to Sam, and she knew with a certainty that she was looking into the face of Satan. "You, You are...Mom, he is..."

"Was." Sam said. "Lucifer wore me like that demon wore you."

Another little piece of information left out, Kim thought.

"What can kill it? I need to know, now." Kim said to Sam.

"We can't get to them!" Sam said in frustration.

"Just watch me." Kim responded.


	19. Chapter 19

Wind kicked up and swirled between them tearing apart the room around the warlock. Dean was unimpressed. He felt a little tired, still hungry, annoyed. He felt so many small individual emotions. He sifted through them looking for something. Something was missing. He felt different.

The warlock continued to vent his rage on the room. Dean saw him levitate off the floor with his head thrown back. He fleetingly wondered if it was elated or infuriated. He crossed his arms and briefly ducked to avoid a flying lamp.

Simon was gone. The physical body housing the warlock was restricting him. He didn't need it. He knew that if he let his rage loose with his power focused he could corporealize briefly. His existence was over, he was ready to fall into hell or purgatory to pay the price for this one last glorious act.

He tried to call her face to mind, her voice, her spirit. Rage ripped through him when he realized she was fading from his memory. The likeness was no longer clear. He did this to them.

He felt himself lift from the floor as he bellowed in rage.

Dean watched the flesh begin to singe then boil and fall away. The smell reminded him of hell. The horror of watching a man incinerate was just icing on the cake. The human peeled away into a mound of cinders leaving an emaciated silvery red caricature of the being he remembered from hell. The sound coming from where its mouth tore at Dean's calmness, but it held.

"That's a really good look for you." Dean said with a cocky grin as the being bared its claws and flung itself at him.

O00o0o0o0o0o0

Kim grabbed the knives and dipped an empty diet coke bottle into a bucket of holy water Sam had made. She shoved it all down her shirt and climbed out the window onto the fire escape. Sam followed her with a sawed off shotgun and a glock loaded with silver rounds. Maybe one would work, maybe not.

They shuffled over the broken glass from the windows that had blown of the next room. Eerie light and a horrible smell poured out the window frames. Kim stuck her leg through the window to climb in but Sam pulled her behind him to enter first.

A floating...something, a spirit or some type of demon that he had never seen screeched at his brother. He felt himself shoved aside, ruining his aim as Kim pushed through the window behind him.

Sam's shot went wild and hit the ceiling blowing a hole into the third floor. The beast reared back as Kim tossed the silver blade striking it between the shoulder blades before it could touch Dean. Black steaming goo leaked out around the imbedded blade. It turned furiously toward her and she felt herself lifted by an unseen force and pinned to the corner of the room near the ceiling.

Sam finished his reload and blasted the warlocks chest but it spun back to its target. Kim fell from the wall with an undignified thump when it focused all its attention on Dean. When it reached for Dean he didn't pull away. He drew his fist back and punched the beast square in the jaw. It stopped its assault for just a second, as if stunned by Deans puny retaliation.

Something had to be broken, she figured, she was too old to get tossed around like that. She had one knife left, the demon blade, and the bottle with holy water. Kim threw the knife and it hit the wall to the left of Dean and fell to the floor. That left the bottle, which didn't seem much of a defense. What the hell, it was all she had.

Dean was backed against the door as the beast leaned into him. Its breath was hot and rank, and he turned his face away from it. Heat radiated from the arms boxing him in so he had no way to escape. It felt like the focus of the world was centered between them. He felt a comforting cool spot against his chest and reached up to hold the charm that someone had hung around his neck.

He was good. He knew he was going to die. He realized in that instant when he expected to see his life pass before his eyes that he was at peace. He had forgiven himself. Wait, he had forgiven himself for everything. He looked up into the warlock's face and gave it his best mocking grin.

He had been hiding. Hiding from the truth of what he had done, from his decisions and from his guilt. It was gone and he was free. He knew the world would be OK without him, so would his brother. The weight of the world was off his shoulders.

As the warlock bared its teeth Dean saw and arc of holy water splash across them. It threw its head back and wailed in agony turning toward the assault. Dan impulsively lifted the cord holding the charm over his head and draped it around the neck of the beast as he squatted to retrieve the demon blade from the floor.

Before it could turn back to Dean it began to claw at the cord trying to dislodge it. Dean leaned up and buried the blade to the hilt into its chest.

Time stopped. There was no sound.

It pulled the blade out and looked at it as Dean dropped into a practiced roll to evade its reach. The black liquid oozing from its wounds seemed to turn to tendrils of steam that floated into the air. Another shotgun blast threw it against the wall where it seemed to heave for breath.

Sam kicked open the door and grabbed for the pail of holy water in the next room. He tossed the contents over the warlock and it seemed to begin to dissolve. The molten flesh turned a powdery gray and began to fall away.

Sparks rose from the beast and hissed quietly. Sam lapsed into a quick Latin exorcism just to be safe as the creature deteriorated.

"I will see you in hell." It hissed at Dean with its last breath.

"Maybe." Dean said,as the last if it fell away, dropping the charm into the pile of ash. "But, then again, maybe not."

Sam reached into the pile to retrieve the charm, but it was too hot. Dean reached down and picked it up with ease. He blew on it and rubbed it on his shirt before hanging it back around his neck.

"Can't be too careful." he said.


	20. Chapter 20

It was dead. It was over, wasn't it? It was over. Had to be. He had his brother back. There were things to talk about with Dean, but they would wait. He wanted to hit that magic shop on the way out of town and talk to the owner. There was something strange about that whole situation.

But really, what is another strange situation in a string of strange situations?

When the smoke had cleared, Kims other daughters had already arrived and found Kelly. Perfect timing for them to watch the violent conclusion of their little drama. He was amused that there seemed to be no hysteria, and a shocking lack of explanation requested.

He thought about Kim briefly as he tied up loose ends. She had been great, he really liked her. She would make a good hunter. He figured he should avoid mentioning that.

Sam bent and swept the pile of ashes into a hex box which he welded shut, He stuffed the box into a small lead pail. He Hammered a silver plate over it as a lid after filling it with holy water. He used his knife to carve a Templar cross into the silver. The pail sat in a crate that had been used to house cursed objects. Dean wrapped it tightly in silver wire. The boys lowered the heavy bucket into a hole dug in the cellar of the bar. Layer upon layer of magic housed the remains of the warlock. It didn't feel like enough. Not by a long shot.

Sam had dug the hold three feet deep and poured a thin spill of concrete at the base. As it set he had carved a devils trap into the hardening cement. Inch by inch they poured layers of cement in shrouding the crate, carving in symbols of protection before starting again. The crate was in effect its coffin. They would take no chances.

Holy relics were scattered in the concrete tomb being created for what was left of the Warlock. Dean bent over the final resting place they were constructing. He thought of it more as a prison. It gave him no small sense of satisfaction to watch a piece of his past be well and truly buried.

The Impala was was already packed. Sam had picked up some info on the internet that pointed to a young witch, maybe two. The trail was hot, Dean was kind of shocked some other hunter didn't scoop it up. The family and the bartenders had been generous, and they had supplies that should last weeks.

Kim and her daughters hovered around in the background chatting and trying their best to help. Harley sat near the edge of the hole with her face buried in a book of latin spells and invocations. She took a cell phone picture of each page as she finished it. Sam almost brought up the danger of playing in spells when you were not of the craft, but the look on her mother's face said she would handle that in her own way.

The four women sported fresh identical tattoos on their forearms mimicking the symbols Sam had drawn on Kim. Wise Idea. They were on the demon radar now.

"I'm making you dinner. Kelly said to the boys. Chicken pot pie, followed by apple and pumpkin pie, with a side of cherry pie for you...she said looking at Dean, and Grilled scallop and goat cheese salad with pears for you, she said to Sam. I make a mean sorbet for dessert. Very healthy. I can see you are...very healthy. She said with a smile.

"Uhhhh thanks," Sam said, looking toward Kim to see her reaction. He kind of wanted to crawl under the table and hide, but no luck. His brother was enjoying every minute. Dean had his best _I'm __charming and I know it and I'm getting pie_ smile.

Dean walked to Kim and nodded to her that he would like to talk privately. She reluctantly followed him up the stairs leaving Sam alone surrounded by three annoyingly attentive girls.

"I just wanted to thank you. I know you got tossed into something you didn't expect. You saved me, both of us. I was angry with you, hostile, I'm not sure why. You took care of me anyway. So, well, thanks."

"You're welcome." She said staring into his beautiful face. There was nothing else to say. She didn't want to do it again, not for anything. She learned things about the world that she never needed or wanted to know. Now she had to live day to day knowing that there are things in the dark, and they will kill you. Her kids knew too. She seemed more troubled over it then they did.

"I wanted to ask you, when I was …...out, I heard something every now and then. It drew my attention, kept me tethered, kind of, to this place. I was wondering if you, well, heard it too? Every time I woke up you were there, so if it was real maybe you heard it."

"I don't remember hearing anything unusual, what did you hear."

"Hymns."

Kim's oldest daughter sprinted up the stairs and burst into the conversation on the way to the back room.

"Oh, don't tell me Mom was singing to you...shes terrible." the girl said bursting into laughter.

Kim turned five shades of red. "I didn't really sing, I mostly hummed." "Quit it young lady, you are no rock star yourself." "We couldn't exactly chat, he was unconscious!"

Kim sat on the stairs and Dean sat companionably next to her. She let out a sigh, and looked straight ahead as she talked to Dean. In most ways he still seemed like a stranger despite the time she had spent with the boys.

"When I was in Iraq we had a field hospital. The area was really pretty safe, as safe as it got anyway. I was seven months into a nine month deployment. My kids were home fending for themselves, my husband had already been killed in the line of duty. I got too comfortable. I got attached to the kids who were stationed there. I felt like their Mom. A lot of them needed one."

"There was an ambush. It shouldn't have happened, but it did. One of the boys, Eric, you remind me of him. Nice boy from the bible belt. So handsome, always a smile and a kind word. That part didn't remind me of you," She chuckled.

"He took a bullet to the shoulder, if we could have evacuated right away he would be home with his brothers right now. But we were pinned down. Three days we took fire, the wound went bad, there was nothing I could do. "

"In the end he wasn't in pain. I held him across my lap. I hummed to him and it seemed to give him comfort. He passed in my arms. Three hours later they cleared the insurgents out. Too little too late. For him. I wrote to his mother, tried to let her know he didn't suffer. I don't know if she ever got it."

"I never told anyone that." She said sneaking a glance at him, swallowing heavily.

"You gave him comfort." Dean said.

"Ya think?" Kim questioned thoughtfully.

"He left this world and took the hymns with him. Heaven is a beautiful place. I've seen it. He is at peace now. You can be sure of that." Dean said quietly.

"How can you be sure?" Kim said, tears filling her eyes.

"Because there are no hymns in Hell."


	21. Epilogue

The trauma room was wild, two MVAs and a gun shot wound, half the staff was elbow deep in gore. Kim hurried to the supply closet to grab more fluids and ran chest to chin into a gangly scruffy man stuffing his pockets.

"Oh for God's sake!" Kim said shoving the man aside. "Cant you find something better to steal, this is a hospital for Christ's sake."

The man stood there stunned as she tucked bags and tubing under her arm and hurried out of the room. He thought for just a second before following her.

"Do you have a second?" he yelled as he hurried up behind her, taking her arm and steering her into a vacant exam room.

"What? Seriously? Take off before I call security!" She said looking down at the hand restraining her. It was covered in blood. His coat didnt look much better. "Oh great, just great." she said.

"I need some help. My friends had a little ….mishap. We are federal agents under cover. If you could just help us out your government would be eternally grateful."

Kim looked at the pitiful sight in front of her and shook her head. "Stay here." she said before running the supplies to the melee in progress just around the corner. " Government agent my ass."

She took a deep breath before returning to the room where the man waited. She had done this before. She was never going to do this again, she swore it. She pulled back the long sleeved shirt under her scrubs exposing her line of tattoos before walking in. "Christo."

"Oh my God, you're a hunter!" The man said as he sagged in relief. "I had a feeling when I saw you that you..."

"No, I'm not. I had the misfortune of meeting a couple of brothers recently that introduced me to the whole _hunter_ thing." "How bad is it, is everyone conscious? what do you need." She said resigned.

"Uhh, well my …..coworker Shane needs a few stitches, maybe, 80? and Jack dislocated his arm, and maybe broke his wrist. He may need a few stitches himself. Wait. Brothers? Sam and Dean! You met Sam and Dean! Dean is a special friend of mine, we have worked a few cases together. They couldn't have managed without me."

"I noticed that you seem pretty injury free." She said under her breath. "Ya, Sam and Dean. Never need to see them again." In truth, she thought of them more often than she would like. She hoped wherever they were that they were safe.

"So, can you help us? We are kind of on the run, a little misunderstanding with the police." He said failing miserably at charm.

Kim grabbed a paper towel and scribbled the address to the bar on it. She reluctantly handed it to the man.

"Go in through the back. Up the stairs first door on your left. Bar tender is Gary, if he sees you tell him you are friends of Connie. I'll be off at 11:30, stay there and stay quiet. I'll patch you up, then I want you gone, are we clear?" She said.

"Thanks Connie." He said reaching out his hand to shake hers.

"The name is Kim." She said, peeking out of the room to see if the coast was clear for the man.

"Pleased to meet you Kim, My name is Garth."


End file.
